Somewhat an alternate universe-ish brothers take on Yuuji and Sukuna. It doubles as an origin story for the canon Sukuna which takes a lot of inspiration from the mythology of the real Ryomen Sukuna. There are some cameos here so have fun spotting them!
DISCLAIMER: All characters mentioned are owned by the great Gege Akutami. I am merely using their characters and inducing more pain to satiate my heart.
Part 3 of 3 AM Jujutsu Fics
CURSED
They were cursed before they were born. Cursed to live poor, unfortunate lives devoid of warmth and happiness before they even knew the reason why.
It all started with a young woman that was betrayed by a man whom she thought reciprocated the love she had for him. They spent the nights together, deeply infatuated and filled with each other's attention, until one of them wasn't.
They called her a whore and cursed her unclean state. A young woman no older than fifteen who lay with a man out of marriage. They threw her out of the village, chucking rocks at her as she ran to make them feel good about their own self-righteousness. She had nothing but thin layers of yukata to protect herself from the harsh winter that was to come.
She walked on up into the mountain with her heart crying out in sorrow at how easily she was cast aside. She built a small house for herself and the life that grew within her stomach with only thoughts of contempt and disgust towards the people she once trusted and loved.
"This world is cruel...I promise, I will never let it be cruel to you."
The new soul's first memory was feeling another hand wrapped around their own. The hand stirred every time soothing circles caressed them from beyond the darkness. It remembered a soft melody that hummed them to sleep; and the soul remembered how easily they stumbled. They roused from inside the belly only to be calmed down by hands that cradled them as though they were already born.
"I will protect both of you forever."
The soul remembered how deeply their mother loved them, just as much as how their mother loathed humanity that abandoned her and her progeny.
The next, and last thing the soul remembered was wrinkled hands holding them in bloodied sheets. They were passed into the hands of a pale faced woman who blinked away the tears in her eyes. With her dying breath, she gave them her blessing with a pained smile.
"Sukuna and Yuuji… live a long life for me."
Sukuna and Yuuji were cursed the moment they were born, not by their mother, but by the people that sentenced her to death.
They remembered everything from the moment they were conceived. They remembered the treachery of their father, the apathy of the townsfolk, the jeers of envious women, and the way their mother cursed every single one of them before she went to bed and sang them to sleep.
Sukuna took their mother's dying wish to heart. He and Yuuji would live a long life together, and he would do it while protecting Yuuji. He would never let humans hurt him, not in the way they hurt their mother.
The brothers lived in total isolation in the mountain. They had no material or monetary belongings, and thus lived a poor life. They starved together, but they also survived together.
They were cursed to live a harsh life, but it was nothing as long as they had each other. Sukuna existed for Yuuji, and Yuuji existed for Sukuna. They relied on each other, and they protected each other.
"We're twins, and twins stick together."
Even with their bond and similar memories of the past, Sukuna and Yuuji interpreted it differently. Sukuna loathed humanity, just as their mother did. He inherited her anguish and lamentations about ever trusting another person. He only saw the world as black and white, and humans were smeared in the darkest ink of all. Even the kindest of people were not spared from his animosity towards them.
They killed his mother, that in itself was unforgivable.
Yuuji however, inherited the love that their mother had for them. He understood the pain and bitterness Sukuna carried for the people that left them to die, but he naively believed and hoped that one day the village would come to their senses. He believed in the goodness of people's hearts that hadn't been dyed black.
He also hoped that their father would realize his mistake and come find them high up in the mountains.
It was a foolish dream, and Sukuna made sure to stomp away that dream from Yuuji's head.
Sukuna was the older twin, born minutes ahead of Yuuji, so he took it upon himself to teach Yuuji about the truth of the unforgiving world. He promised to protect him no matter what happened. But as though by some absurd karmic fate, Sukuna was born weaker than Yuuji.
It was as if the Gods spat on his existence. A child born with a mind beyond his age, one so full of rage towards other humans, and decided that he was too dangerous to be made powerful. The mischievous Gods cursed him with a weak constitution, and bound him to helplessness that frustrated him to no end.
It was shameful, but Sukuna had to rely on his younger brother to do all the hard work instead. While Sukuna stayed inside, preparing food and cleaning the house, Yuuji was out hunting and gathering wood.
Yuuji was Sukuna's complete opposite. If Sukuna was riddled with hatred, Yuuji only felt love. He was the blessed twin, chosen by the Gods to have an empathic heart and incredible strength. He was a pacifist burdened with the strength of a warrior, the speed and agility of a wild animal, and the fortitude of a mountain.
Sukuna would give anything to have his brother's abilities to be able to keep them safe. Yuuji was far too nice to hit people even with his strength; not that they ever crossed paths with another human being. Even with his reluctance to hurt another living being, Yuuji still trained to carry the burden Sukuna could not.
"I'm going to protect us Suku-nii, you'll see! So cook my favorite tonight alright?"
For all the violent thoughts Sukuna had, he heartily wished that Yuuji would never have to hurt or worse, kill another human for his sake. He didn't want to sully his brother's soul for his inborn rage. If they ever needed to kill anyone, it would be on his hands, not Yuuji.
Sukuna loved their slow, lonely, life in the mountain. It was quiet and serene at best, even peaceful if he took time to hear the forest around him. Sukuna could not stand the idea of humans but he did love the sounds of animals. He cared for the birds and the wolves that sometimes came by sniffing for boar meat.
Their life was perfect.
Yuuji yelled joyously as a greying old man appeared by the mountain's edge, and Sukuna clicked his tongue.
Almost perfect. He had to suffer through his brother's growing attachment to this old man that raised them after their mother passed. They called them grandfather but Sukuna knew they were not related by blood at all.
They knew nothing of the old man's past other than he had acted as their guardian since they were young. Whenever Yuuji asked him about stories about their mother, and what their family was like, the old man always zoned off and dismissed it as a result of poor memory.
Yuuji never thought much about it, but Sukuna did.
They remembered everything their mother went through, but it was only Sukuna who remembered everything from the moment they were born. He remembered the old man's eyes on the first time Sukuna opened his.
The old man's eyes looked at him with unease. He cradled Sukuna with a light tremor in his arm, frightened by the baby that didn't cry and stared at him with sharp red eyes.
You're one of them.
When their mother died, the old man intended to leave them behind to die until something changed his mind. Sukuna wasn't sure how it happened, but the apprehension in the old man's eyes magically washed away into tears when he held Yuuji gently in his arms like he was the most fragile thing in the world.
He held Yuuji like he was his own blood and cared for him like he was his everything. Unfortunately, his love only extended to Yuuji and only to Yuuji.
Sukuna never called the old man, grandfather because unlike his delusional brother, he knew the truth. They had no other family other than each other. If he had to fake his respect towards the old man for Yuuji's sake, he would continue to do so, but Sukuna simply did not care about anyone else other than Yuuji. As long as he was happy, and he smiled as though he didn't care about a single thing in the world, Sukuna was content with pretending.
He was not strong like Yuuji, but he was smarter than him. He would protect him in his own way.
They were around nine when the old man suddenly stopped visiting.
Sukuna had a feeling he knew what happened to the old man, and as he watched Yuuji pace in their house, worried, he knew he would have to break the truth to him sooner or later.
"No, he can't be dead," Yuuji stubbornly said. "He promised to bring us some melon bread today! He's probably just tired, I'm going to go wait for him in the clearing."
"No, you won't," Sukuna said. "That was the very first rule we made and we never break that rule. If the old man choked and died somewhere in the mountain, then good riddance to him. He's not even our real grand-"
Sukuna blinked at how fast Yuuji's hand slapped him across the face.
Yuuji glowered at him with brown eyes just as intimidating as a tiger cub. "Don't say that. He's the only family we have left. Wouldn't you be a little bit sad if he died without us knowing?"
Sukuna really wouldn't feel anything even if he overheard the birds chirping about a dead man in a ditch. Still, this was a big deal to Yuuji, and Sukuna could never deny his brother.
"I know you don't believe me when I say he isn't our grandfather, but… why can't he be?" Yuuji said. "He raised us right? He taught us to read and write. He taught you how to cook, and he taught me how to hunt. Even if we aren't...related, he's been there for us. If he's in danger or - or - we should be there. We owe him that at least."
Sukuna turned away. There was only one way for them to find out what really happened, and Sukuna was not willing to risk everything for a man that initially wanted to kill them. If they went down there, the people would recognize them. Pink hair was not exactly common.
"Please, Suku-nii." Sukuna gripped the plate in his hand and tried to drown out his brother's pleas. "I'll never ask for anything again! Please. We'll be quiet. I just need to know he's safe."
Sukuna rolled his eyes ten minutes later, unable to deny his brother for too long. "Fine. We'll go when everyone's asleep, and we're only checking, got it? No funny business."
Yuuji blinked the tears in his eyes and wrapped Sukuna in his arms, grateful. Sukuna tried to pry himself away from his little brother's smothering, almost suffocating affection, but welcomed it nonetheless.
Oh, the things he'd do for Yuuji.
Sukuna seethed when he and Yuuji entered the town later that night.
His senses flared at the suffocating energy that greeted them at the town's gates. Sukuna couldn't quite describe it, other than it felt wrong. It was… dangerous and he felt as though he wanted to run away. It's clear that Yuuji also felt it but he was braver than Sukuna and he pushed forward. He led them through the unlit streets seemingly aware of their destination despite never having gone there.
The old man lived in a shack much smaller than their own. There was no light inside so Yuuji stormed right in. Sukuna ran after him with a hiss, before he stopped by the door after he caught whiff of a foul stench.
Yuuji's hands curled into a fist as he and Sukuna stared at the cold pale body sprawled out on the floor while a three headed monster stood over him, its mouth watering as though ready to devour a new feast.
One of the heads snapped at them and grumbled something incomprehensible in three different tones. A cold shudder ran down Sukuna's neck as Yuuji screamed bloody murder and punched the monster off the old man. The monster crashed through the wall, screeching in pain before it scrambled on its two small legs and waved its lengthy arms around, toppling over more wooden boxes and hay unto the ground.
Sukuna ran after the monster, afraid that it might circle back and attack Yuuji while the latter mourned the loss of their grandfather. The monster crashed into a fire pit and scorched some of its skin. It squealed and trashed around, smashing into houses that spurred the village awake.
To Sukuna's confusion, none of the village noticed the three headed behemoth ambling past them.
They only saw him, standing in the middle of a wreckage with his striking pink hair and cursed red eyes. The people who were old enough to remember their mother's similar features yelled profanities his way. While those that didn't recognize his features, ran to protect him as a child.
It wasn't until the monster ate the top half of one of the women did everything fall to chaos. Purely out of circumstance, and combined with the village's prejudice, the blame lay unto him.
Sukuna may be the weaker twin, but he ran just as fast as Yuuji could at that moment. He made his way back to Yuuji before the villagers could catch him with their katana's and makeshift weapons. He stormed through the door and caught Yuuji dragging the old man out of the house on a bloodied bedsheet.
"What are you doing?! The whole village is awake because of that thing you punched! We have to go!"
Yuuji mirrored the alarm on his face but looked down at the old man with a sullen expression in his eyes. Oh no, Sukuna knew what that meant. "No. You promised we would only look."
"I want to bury him," Yuuji said, regardless of Sukuna's words. "Next to mother."
"We don't have time to do that! They're out for blood. If we drag that dead weight with us we're done for. We have to go." He grabbed Yuuji's hand to lead them away but the latter pulled back.
"I am not leaving without him."
"You brat -" Sukuna heard the villagers' clamor approach closer, so he made a foolish decision. He pushed Yuuji at the old man's head then grabbed the futon by his feet. "Fine. Hurry up! If we die I'm going to kill you myself!"
Just as Sukuna feared, they didn't get very far with a deceased body in tow. Yuuji may be strong for his age but the weight he carried along with the weight Sukuna could was too difficult for two children.
The villagers caught up with them, and the sight of the decaying old man swinging between the two identical children caused them to stir more in anger. A rock bounced off Yuuji's head and he fell back, rolling down the slope where an armed man caught him by the hair. Yuuji struggled to break free but refused to use his strength.
Sukuna ran to save Yuuji but was caught by another man with a katana. The sword swung at his face, cutting right below his left eye. Vibrant red bled down the curve of his cheek and dyed his white kimono red.
He let out a guttural scream and tried to tackle the swordsman. The man simply kicked him towards a tree at the same time he heard Yuuji cry. The world appeared to move in slow motion as another sword flung itself downwards to decapitate the defenseless boy.
Sukuna scrambled to his feet, his mind only filled with a single thought. He couldn't lose Yuuji. Anyone but Yuuji. Sukuna wouldn't be able to live with himself if the only person he saw of value in this world died.
Sukuna existed for Yuuji, and Yuuji existed for Sukuna. They were twins that existed as a whole, without the other, life would lose meaning.
He shouldn't have broken their rule.
If he hadn't broken it, if he wasn't so weak to protect both himself and Yuuji, then they wouldn't be in this position. As the blade swung closer to Yuuji's head, Sukuna cursed everything that he could if Yuuji's life ended before him now.
He would never forgive the village for cursing them because of their parentage. He would never accept death as their final sentence.
They had to live long together. That was their mothers final wish.
A gnawing sensation spurred at the pit of his stomach. It burned like a festering flame, filled with tenacity to survive with his brother, and fueled with contempt. No one was going to take Yuuji away from him. They had no right to hurt them.
Sukuna started to lose hope as he ran the distance between them that was far too wide. He felt a rush of dread climb up his arms as he refused the possibility that he might lose Yuuji tonight. He shook it off. There was no way he would let the humans win again. An electric thrum ran around the tips of his fingers then an idea sparked in his mind.
He didn't know where it came from, but he moved as though he was capable of this power since he was born. Sukuna moved his fingers as though to grab at Yuuji and to pull him closed, then a razor sharp thread pierced through the air, quite literally breaking the clamour that surrounded them.
It was as though the world stood still and grew silent around them until a horrified wail echoed around them
A sword fell across Yuuji's face, which cut a portion of his cheek underneath his right eye. The blade stood erect on a small space between Yuuji's chest and his arm, its hilt still had a bloodied hand attached to it. Blood spilled all over Yuuji's face who stared wide eyed, and mouth agape, unable to move nor speak as the man that fell back was too distressed at his amputated hand to stop the bleeding.
More men raised their arms to attack them, and Sukuna moved out of instinct again. He swiped his hands and instead of just a single blade, nets of invisible edges cut through skin and bone, killing all that met its path.
This world was cruel and unforgiving, and Sukuna was not beyond what it wanted him to be. He would be cold and relentless to anyone that dared hurt them. A small whimper came out of Yuuji's mouth as more bodies piled up before him. Sukuna took the gap between them and hauled his brother upright, who's legs shook at the sight.
They absconded to their home, surrounded by the mist of cloud. Yuuji clung to Sukuna mouthing words of apologies while he desperately wiped off the blood that won't come off his hands.
They never should have gone down the mountain.
Sukuna held Yuuji close and caged him as though he could lose him the moment he let go. He had the power to protect him now. Whatever this power was, he was going to make sure no one ever dared hurt them again.
Yuuji lost a part of himself that day, and Sukuna blamed himself for making it so.
He was the one that chose to break the rule they made. He was the one that used his new power to slaughter all those people. He used it to protect Yuuji, but his brother did not see things as simple as he did. They were still lives sacrificed so that they may live.
Yuuji was a pacifist that believed in resolving conflict without bloodshed, Sukuna did not. He felt no sympathy for the lives that were lost that night. They deserved all their suffering and more. Quite simply, Sukuna didn't think it was enough to make them feel just how much they and their mother went through on their own.
Even though he felt no guilt over the villager's he murdered, Sukuna felt responsible for tainting his brother's pure heart. Yuuji still performed his responsibilities and conversed with Sukuna as though nothing happened, but Yuuji never smiled the way he did before. He never looked at the village from their vantage point with wide hopeful eyes anymore, but rather he looked down at it with a sullen almost apologetic gaze. It was as if he was disappointed in them.
He also looked at Sukuna with the same discouraged face, and sometimes, if Sukuna wasn't looking, a regretful eye. Much like how Sukuna blamed himself for Yuuji's pain, Yuuji blamed himself for burdening Sukuna with the responsibility he wasn't strong enough to carry.
Yuuji wasn't strong enough to protect them.
In a horrible twist of fate, they found their situations reversed.
Yuuji who was once the strongest of the two, succumbed to his fault and secluded himself from the world. True to his word before they went down to the village, Yuuji never asked Sukuna for anything ever again. Even in his isolation, Yuuji worked to become independent from Sukuna, who insisted that they were better together than apart.
Thankfully Yuuji agreed, but Sukuna wasn't comforted with the thought Yuuji left him with. "You'd do worse to them if I left."
Sukuna got what he wanted, but Yuuji lost the happiness that he wanted to protect at all cost. It was his fault that Yuuji sacrificed so much for them, and Sukuna was baffled as to how he could fix it.
Yuuji also didn't know how he could be fixed, and before Sukuna knew it, they started to drift apart.
Sukuna refused to let go of his contempt for the people that killed their mother and poisoned his brother's innocence. His newfound strength and power scared him, but it was also cathartic. All that rage and anger he'd been keeping within him all this time manifested through a blade that slashed through obstacles mercilessly. It was liberating. It felt like for the first time in years that Sukuna could finally breathe.
Whatever this power was, it felt like it was something he'd been missing for all this time. Using it made him feel alive, and even if Yuuji warned him about the consequences of using it, or perhaps even exploring it further, Sukuna couldn't and didn't want to stop. Now that Yuuji vowed to never lift a finger of his strength against humans, Sukuna had no choice but to use his power to protect them.
Regardless of whether this ability of his was a blessing or a curse from the Gods, Sukuna knew there was a reason he woke to it now. Sukuna had a role to play, and he was determined to keep that role alive.
Yuuji seemed to understand his brother's conviction, and despite his contrasting opinion, kept it to himself. He simply pleaded that Sukuna refrained from shedding too much unnecessary blood. Yuuji still cared about humanity, but he also did not want to lose his only family left.
They were twins, and twins stuck together; trapped in each other's misery.
Even if Sukuna respected his brother's wishes, the village did not make it easy for them to live in peace. The people's vendetta against them led to various attempts against their life. They never got anywhere close to finding their home because Sukuna killed them the moment they stepped foot in their forest.
Sukuna took their lives without remorse, and for every new body he cut in half, he felt more and more ecstatic, almost invigorated by the look in their eyes before he inevitably killed them. Yuuji knew his brother was falling lower and lower to depths he could not follow, and simply turned a blind eye.
Sukuna didn't want Yuuji to follow him in this sinful landscape, so he let Yuuji further distance himself from him. If he could protect Yuuji by being cruel to those that were intent to kill them, then Sukuna didn't need a soul.
He only needed to protect Yuuji.
As long as they lived a long life as their mother wished, nothing else mattered.
Years passed, and their mountain grew to be feared by all. They became bedtime stories that mother's told their children as monsters that spirited the naughty children. They were the harbingers of discord and mortality in the town that wanted to put a face on someone to blame. They became a curse that tore apart anyone that dared walk into their forest uninvited.
Sukuna felt something change as years of people's fears fueled the energy around them.
Yuuji felt it too, but unlike Sukuna who wasn't as well read as the former, he managed to put a feeling behind it. This lingering new energy in their air was a dark amalgamation of fear, anger, grief, dread, and despair. It was directed towards them and the very mountain they live in.
It was a suffocating form of energy that was sickeningly vile. It was like humanity's worst emotions were thrown into a single pot to brew and simmer into an indestructible power. Sukuna didn't quite get it, but he understood how much of a nuisance it was in their mountain.
This… cursed energy distracted him from channeling and controlling the same energy that coursed through him. All Sukuna felt was ill-intent towards humanity and that made his energy strong. However his current cursed energy was dwarfed by the collective cursed thoughts that now resided in the mountain. It gave birth to creatures that oddly reminded them of the three headed creature they saw in the old man's house.
The first time they encountered a cursed spirit, Yuuji acted on instinct and smashed it with his unchecked strength. He tried to apologize and heal it but the spirit crumbled to dust before he could. Only the weaker ones approached Yuuji who mostly found their presence annoying and just shooed them away if they ever tried to bother him. He may have sworn off violence, but against non-humanoid creatures, Yuuji seemed perfectly fine threatening them with force.
Sukuna on the other hand exorcised those that pissed him without hesitation. They were mostly creatures that acted on instinct to kill and terrorize humans, ideals that aligned with Sukuna's own, so he mostly left them alone. They made his life slightly easier after all.
After a while, Sukuna noticed that some of the curses grew stronger and larger than others. They gained some semblance of thought but not nearly enough to be conversational. The small ones responded to simple instructions such as moving items in the house, or carrying messages from Yuuji to Sukuna, or even picking up fruits high up in the trees; while the large ones, which strolled in the outskirts of the forest, answered to Sukuna.
Most of them grew cocky and would attempt to fight him, but they would all meet the same fate. Those that were smart enough to avoid angering him, decided to please him instead. They'd offer him decapitated heads, cut limbs, sometimes small organs they thought was a nice trophy from wandering villagers. Sukuna never praised them for their service because he wanted to end those people himself. In time, the curses they shared the mountain with learned to leave anyone that dared enter the forest alive for Sukuna to kill.
The curses and Sukuna made a game out of it. The curses would torment them as much as they could, then Sukuna would satisfy his violent urges by taking their life after they had begged for it. It was a new sport that Yuuji absolutely loathed.
It was around that time that Yuuji began disappearing at the crack of dawn, only to return before supper was finished. Sukuna, slaughterer of men and master of curses, couldn't muster out the courage to ask his brother where he went, and instead blindly trusted Yuuji's discretion. Whatever he was doing, Sukuna was certain it wasn't anything that aimed to destroy what they had.
So when Yuuji returned to their house one evening with an injured child in his arms, Sukuna couldn't stop the initial anger that rose from his chest. He lifted his arm, eyes boring at the terrified villager in his brother's arms, eager to slice through the child's neck. Yuuji stopped him from making a mistake and explained everything as briefly as he could.
Yuuji had enough of Sukuna's ceaseless killing and decided to do something about it. He knew Sukuna would be against it so he did so in secret. He woke up early, disappearing for the same amount of time as his brother in the forest to catch as many people he could before his brother of his curses could. He would lead them off the path, undetected and unnoticed, by those he's saved. Just as he promised, Yuuji never left the forest nor entered the village, he only redirected those that ventured in their forest to safety.
Even if they were only a few, Yuuji felt like he found a new purpose in saving lives his brother would inevitably end if found. The child was one of those lucky souls that Yuuji found before Sukuna did.
Sukuna looked at the bruises on the child's arms, then at their oddly angled leg that was starting to take on a hideous color. He sighed as the situation clicked in his mind. Yuuji found an injured child, and his heart, despite being broken and betrayed by humans, couldn't live with himself if he let the kid die on his watch.
Yuuji looked at him with those wide ochre eyes, begging like he once did before that fateful morning. Sukuna faltered, missing the way Yuuji looked at him like he was the world and caved in. Yuuji finally smiled from ear to ear.
"Here that, Uraume?" Yuuji cheered. "You don't have to be scared anymore. Suku-nii and I will take care of you. You'd be able to walk again in no time."
Uraume turned to Sukuna with distant pink colored eyes then smiled meekly. The child stayed with them for a while, which helped spark Yuuji's happiness once again. As Sukuna watched the two of them play around with the small curses outside their house, for a moment he thought, that maybe.
Maybe they could go back to the way they once were.
"Don't… curse them…" Yuuji begged him with a raspy breath.
Sukuna swung his arm and two sorcerers fell behind them in a soft thud. "Shut up… Just, keep your strength, I'll get us out of here soon."
A black wolf ran lunged for Sukuna who dodged it and threw it back with a flick of his hand. The wolf whimpered as it crashed into a tree, and it's white furred counterpart fell from high ground. It snapped a heavy jaw on Sukuna's arm, mangling it with enough force to tear through muscle and bone. Sukuna cut through its head but the familiar was called back into shadows.
The hakama wearing cursed user before them clapped his hands to form a bird with his hands. In a spark of lightning, an owl-like bird with large orange-feathered wings and a white mask on its head spread its wings high above them.
Sukuna grabbed Yuuji who fought out a whimper as they moved. They absconded into the trees with howling wolves close behind. Sukuna flipped around to kick the dog just in time to miss the black dog's jaw and Yuuji followed with a weak, yet still solid hit across the dog's skull.
Sukuna dragged clawed hands up into the air to finally get a chance at hitting the damn mutt, but again the Hakama wearing man called it back to shadow.
The spot where the dog's shadow fell began to grow and morphed solid ground into a muddy, almost tar like surface. Sukuna lost his footing and fell first into the mass of shadow. It bubbled around him, with tiny hands wrapping around him as though creatures trapped within it were trying to consume him.
Yuuji rolled beside him, coughing out blood as he hit the still solid ground. He tried to reach for Sukuna, despite his own injuries until a barrage of condensed blood thread pierced through his chest, with the final one cutting through his forehead.
Sukuna's breath got caught in his throat as he watched Yuuji fall. His eyes, which had only started recovering from the loss of that old man after so many years, were frozen into small frightened orbs.
Sukuna shuddered at the sight of his brother's last moment, his lips moving ever so slightly to remind the former of something he couldn't hear. His brother's dead eyes stared at him just inches away from him and Sukuna fought against the tar that clung to him like poison.
This was Sukuna's fault again.
They didn't expect that sorcerers would invade their land. They didn't expect people capable of powers like Sukuna existed, and they worked to kill vengeful beings like Sukuna. The sorcerers attacked them, to liberate the village that lived in fear of their presence and to save Uraume who did not even want to be saved.
Uraume wanted to disappear from the world they grew to hate.
They wanted to escape the village like Yuuji and Sukuna did. They wanted to live freely the way they wanted to in a place far away from people. They searched for this peace high up in the cursed woods, where the fabled cursed twins and curses thrived. The tales of death didn't scare them, in fact, Uraume, for someone as young as they were, already welcomed the idea of death.
They saw no hope in the future, and wanted to live freely after death. It wasn't until Yuuji saved them from that gutter and was treated more kindly than their own family did, that they learned to seek the future with their own hands.
They were happy to stay with Yuuji and Sukuna on the mountain. Uraume became the third piece to replace the spot the old man left so abruptly. Yuuji started to laugh and smile again, his spirit reinvigorated once again with the presence of another person to care for, and Sukuna found comfort in how he and Uraume shared how they viewed humanity.
They were perfect.
It was supposed to be perfect until the sorcerers came.
Uraume's family hired the sorcerers to drag them back home. They blamed the cursed twins for their abduction and paid for their heads. The sorcerers used cursed technique's, the same magical arts that Sukuna supposedly used, although far more polished. Sukuna and Yuuji, who didn't even have a technique of his own, didn't stand a chance.
Yuuji who refused to fight the sorcerers was the first to fall. A blood manipulator announced their position of power and authority by stabbing him on the leg. Sukuna, furious, fought back before Yuuji could stop and control him. He cut their numbers in half, but even then, the difference in their experience was clear.
The battle against sorcerers was short. Sukuna's techniques were simple and straightforward compared to the trained techniques of their enemies. He couldn't adapt as fast as they could, and Sukuna was defeated.
He lost his pride, and his soul. Without Yuuji, Sukuna didn't have any reason to live anymore. He and Yuuji were born into this world with a curse already attached to them. The world hated them, and Sukuna didn't see a point in living in a world that did not want him nor his brother.
Uraume wailed in the arms of the blood manipulator, begging for Sukuna's forgiveness as the latter crawled over to Yuuji's lifeless body. Sukuna didn't hate Uraume. He couldn't. Not when Uraume shared all of his and Yuuji's pain, even if it was just a short time.
Sukuna cradled Yuuji in his arms. He pressed their foreheads together and closed his eyes. There were no tears in his eyes. He never seemed capable of it since they were born. Only Yuuji had the heart to feel between them, and this world repeatedly broke it until his brother had nothing left to feel.
"I'm sorry…" His hold faltered upon feeling the connection between him and his twin, his beloved baby brother's souls, fading away for every second they stayed this way. "I wasn't strong enough."
The shadow sorcerer placed a hand on Sukuna's head. It was light enough to be mistaken as a warm caring hand that shared his pain and sorrows upon seeing the loss of two brothers. Then Sukuna felt an overwhelming power that coursed through his body that threatened to ruin him from the inside out.
Sukuna glared at the sorcerer, as he cursed everything in that sorcerer's life. He memorized every aspect of his features into memory - spiky blueish black hair with sea green eyes and beautiful eyelashes. He promised to come back to ruin everything the man held precious in exchange for him taking the only person that mattered to Sukuna.
"By this virtue," the man prayed, "at the instant of death, may you take rebirth in Tushita. May you meet the limitless Bodhisattvas and be cared for by Maitreya, our supreme refuge."
Screw the heavenly realm. The Gods had never been merciful towards him and Yuuji. The God's wouldn't be merciful to them even after death. Sukuna resisted the blessing and vowed to stay on this plane.
"I'll kill you," he spat out one final curse. "I'll murder every single sorcerer on earth until you bow to me, begging on your knees for mercy."
The sorcerer looked down at him pitifully, which only sparked the flames of indignation in Sukuna's soul. As the sorcerer cast his final blessing and Sukuna felt his soul flutter away, his memory fading into nothing as he kept him and Yuuji close together like they were in the womb.
They were cursed before they were born.
They were cursed to live miserable lives, but they found a way to be happy in it. Him and Yuuji, and later with Uraume.
They were cursed to suffer a painful death, and unable to resist against fate, Sukuna chose to curse fate instead.
As Sukuna felt his soul edge near finality, he held nothing but hatred and vengeance within his heart and soul.