The thing about UA is that it is overly and unnecessarily extravagant, over-the-top and just—just plain unnecessary. Megumi is happy to know that Kugisaki feels the same way after they decided to pass by the said school on their way to shopping for groceries for the Sugiyama couple. (Okay, maybe UA was in the opposite direction but Megumi and Kugisaki already planned to pass by it either way. And maybe, it is located at the top of a mountain so they had to wear hero-themed shirts in order to just seem like your average Pro-Hero fan that hopes to even catch a glimpse of their favorite Pro-Hero in civilian clothes. Unsurprisingly, Megumi and Kugisaki are not the only ones who were there. Actually, even despite the fact that they passed by during class hours, there were plenty of other 'passersby' that they blended in the background a little too well.) Overall, they shared the same conclusion: why is it too extravagant?

Megumi and Kugisaki thus exchanged ideas: is it because they try to be inclusive to students as much as possible? Considering that they take only the best of the best, it only makes sense that the people entering the school would look more foreign than an average person. Average in their terms, of course. But isn't UA too big? According to further research, UA has a facility they call the 'USJ' or the 'Unforseen Simulation Joint' which is exactly as its name states: a place specifically made to mimic natural disasters and trains the sudents how to handle said situations. And according to even more research, it can easily be compared to the actual USJ because of its size and involved machineries. Not to mention the fact that their head chef in the canteen is apparently a Pro-Hero.

So one might ask, where does the money come from?

As if tempting the students to continue to try for their school, UA is officially a public school, government-funded while their rival in the other side of Musutafu, Shiketsu High School embraces their status as a private school while UA, in Megumi and Kugisaki's opinion, is a private school in all things but name. Not only do they have a terribly low passing rate, only taking the Top 1% of potential Pro-Heroes, but the hierarchy within their years are worrisome. Megumi himself went to a private school, and he knows, in first hand experience, how students can get to one another which is exactly why he had to resort to his fists to discipline those arrogant bastards—not his brightest moment but he does not regret it.

Though they may deny it, the Hero Department is always treated as the superiors to other Departments, something that even Kugisaki is not surprised of. "It's why UA has a higher number of examinees each year. Their entrance exam is less than my allowance when I was in middle school," Kugisaki rolls her eyes, flicking her wrist, "A public school sounds more welcoming and appealing than a private school. Have you seen Shiketsu's uniform? Very intimidating. I love it." She waves a magazine in front of Megumi's face.

Megumi tentatively accepts the magazine. "This isn't that different from ours," ah, how long has it been since he last wore his uniform? It feels odd not wearing them. He only notices it now but he supposes his frequent usage of hoodies and sweatshirts is because of the nostalgia of his uniform's wide collar.

"That's why I like it, obviously." Kugisaki raises an eyebrow. "UA's is... too plain. Looks like your middle school's, Shiritsu-san."

"Stop that."

"Is it true that Gojou-sensei payed for that? He kept on bragging about it when I helped Niita-san report to him on our first day. He couldn't stop talking about it. God."

Megumi hesitates. He briefly glances at Nobara. He can still see the faint scars of the rose-patterned injuries she had only a few weeks ago. He remembers watching her focusing more on her face than the rest of her body when she was trying to get it to heal up as soon as possible. He looks away. The ache of his broken ribs from that day feels too familiar to ignore. "Yeah, he payed for my sister and I," he admits, voice almost clogging at the back of his throat.

He does not know why he did not expect it, but Kugisaki only hums nonchalantly as if they are talking about the weather. She does not make it a big deal unlike the time when she nad Itadori teased him of not sharing too much. Instead, Kugisaki continues. "Damn, I'd love it if Gojou-sensei was my sugar daddy. Did you hear the rumors from the second years?" She leans close.

"What rumors?"

"That he sent ten million yen to a woman in one go."

"What?"

Kugisaki shrugs her shoulders. "Panda-senpai told me after he beat me to the ground."

"And you believe Panda-senpai?"

"It's not something Gojou-sensei won't do, you know."

Megumi has to admit that their Gojou-sensei will indeed do something like that. With a sigh, Megumi steers the conversation back to their original topic. "UA got into an incident recently. They kept it under the wraps though. I only saw one or two sites that were left. A whole class of Hero Department students were expelled, and before that, a whole class of students grom the Business Department and another unnamed class," he grimaces when he feels Kugisaki squeeze to his side to squint at the screen, "This user posted something about UA keeping secrets. They said that this isn't the first time UA is keeping something under the wraps. Right after a few families complained to UA about the expulsion, articles showed up but were shot down immediately."

Kugisaki huff. "The students must have been expelled for a reason, right?" She crosses her arms.

"According to this, the teacher called them undeserving of their position," Megumi cannot imaging their Gojou-sensei expelling them like that, especially not when they have the privilege to have lesser students and in UA's case, too many students. "Is a teacher supposed to have that much power?"

"I would compare him to Gojou-sensei but Gojou-sensei is, well, Gojou-sensei," Kugisaki ends it there. Megumi, too, is uncomfortable with the idea of admitting the fact that their strange teacher is the strongest Jujutsu Sorcerer of the current generation and perhaps, the strongest to have ever existed. While the person who was said to have expelled that many students was not even revealed, only saying that he was a new teacher which sounds even stranger to Megumi. A new teacher expelling around 150 students? That's more than five classes.

"But—" Kugisaki snaps her fingers right in front of Megumi's face, startling him. "—they only got expelled because they were incompetent, right? We're far from incompetent, 'shiguro. As long as we don't stand out, I doubt UA would notice us and besides, we're only staying there for the year, right?"

Megumi lets that sink in. "If the year is over and we still haven't found Itadori or a way to get back home..."

"We're switching to the other side," Kugisaki says that like it is easy and Megumi thinks it is too. This is not their world after all. As long as they are under the belief that they will and can go home, Megumi finds himself caring very little for this world. Sure, there are walking, talking living beings but this is not Megumi's home. They are not going out of their way to hurt anyone, anyway. Megumi simply cares too little for this world. And he has to go home. His sister is still stuck in that hospital, still trapped in that deep, deep slumber, and Itadori is still out there, alive and kicking, so Megumi has to be selfish.

He does not know what is going on inside Kugisaki's head or why she easily agreed to it when Megumi first suggested the one-year deadline for their attempts in finding clues in UA, but Megumi is glad he does not have to explain. Justifying that it is better to go to the 'Villainous' side than the 'Heroic' side is hard. Megumi became a Jujutsu Sorcerer, maybe not to protect people, but he still wants to protect them. He became a sorcerer out of obligation because he had potential that nobody could just let go of and protecting people, the civilians, the weak and the unknowing, it is only a part of that job. But there are no curses here, no people to protect them from, no Tsumiki to wait for, no Curses to fight against. There is only him, Kugisaki, a missing Itadori, and an equally missing way home.

"Wait, wait, wait," Kugisaki suddenly raises her hands in the air, "The only one who can give a speech in the sports festival is the top student from the entrance exam. And by the end of the sports festival, it's the one who gets to be ranked first. Fushiguro—" She sighs. "I think we need to stand out if we want to shove to everyone's faces that we're still alive."

Fushiguro scowls. "Then we will. How good are the average students in the entrance exam?"

"That's the problem. No one knows what happens in the entrance exam. It's a tight-lipped secret. It changes every year," Kugisaki scrolls down the screen, "Three years ago, it was a treasure hunt with obstacles but—but this says that you didn't have to find the treasures to pass. Something about... um, 'true heroism is not about defeating the villains'? That's what the bear guy said in this interview. And two years ago, it was a battle against some other Pro-Heroes pretending to be Villains. This doesn't have many details. And last year, it was a maze."

"Is there a pattern anywhere?"

"This Nezu-guy keeps on saying what I said earlier," Kugisaki clears her throat, raising her index finger, "True heroism is not always about defeating your enemies. I'm assuming that you don't need to finish the actual test in order to pass, or is that too much of a stretch?"

Fushiguro thinks on it, lacing his hands together. "We can't assume. But the Practical Test always stays the same: a simulation of battle," he concludes, "We can stop here. We have to study on Quirk History if we want to pass the exams."

"Ugh." Kugisaki groans. "Their history is ridiculous. Did you know that some Quirk Historian speculated that Oda Nobunaga had a Charisma Quirk, or whatever that's supposed to be?"

"Of course, that's your problem."

Megumi deeply regrets suggesting that Kugisaki should begin training on how to control her strength in terms of her so-called 'Quirk' for two reasons: one, because they are stuck in the isolated Dagobah Beach that is stinking of garbage, and two, because Kugisaki needs a human model in order to test her strength on and that is none other than Megumi. Though her Toy Hammer is definitely not as brutal as her actual hammer, Megumi gets a first glimpse of what knocked out that blonde girl from the Kyoto Branch during their annual meet-up.

Kugisaki surprisingly has better control over her Cursed Energy than Megumi, but this only applies to her nails and not her hammer because of the size. According to Kugisaki herself, it is much easier to shape your Cursed Energy when there is a conduit instead of actually forming it on your own but for Kugisaki who firstly trained on how to use her nails as a conduit, a small external source, she struggles controlling her Cursed Energy to settle mildly in a bigger one, her toy hammer. Megumi watches blandly as Kugisaki's Cursed Energy flickers to its normal flash to a too-small flash, going in and out in mild fashion. "I don't get why I'm doing this," Kugisaki rolls her shoulders exhaustedly, "I can knock out someone with a toy hammer."

"The point is that your Curse Technique is meant to exorcise, not to injure, Kugisaki," Megumi reminds her for the nth time this day. "Our enemies are people not curses."

Pro-Heroes and Heroes-in-Training are heavily scrutinized by the public unless you already have an established standing. One wrong move and everyone is against you in this overly black and white society—the world is divided into two: the good and evil, the black and the white, the Villains and the Pro-Heroes. Megumi reminds himself to differentiate 'heroes' and 'Pro-Heroes', something that he still thinks sounds disgusting as it is portrayed to be. And he knows he is not the only one who has an aversion to these Pro-Heroes. There are hundreds and thousands of blogs with in-depth research that compares the Pre-Quirk Society to the Post-Quirk Society. Despite the supposed 'superhuman' and 'evolved' qualities the present time society has, innovation is painfully slow because little people has the need of it, and thus, slows down society's improvements. In the few hundred years that the Quirk Society exists, little improvements happen.

Man did not have wings, so he made aircrafts. But what if he had always had wings?

Kugisaki stops out of nowwhere, slumping down beside him as she stretches her legs. "So, what are you going to call your Quirk?" She asks.

Megumi grimaces. Like Kugisaki, he is not very comfortable divulging the details of his Cursed Technique just like that to the papers. They agreed not too long ago that Kugisaki will only vaguely put 'the ability to manipulate nails and use voodoo-like skills' for the description of her Quirk while Megumi can 'summon creatures from his shadows'. He is still working on it, truth to be told, because his Gyokuken and his other summons have distinct qualities, to which Kugisaki suggested to simply make it so that they are 'brands' that identify them as his. Both of them hate that description but they do contemplate on it.

"I'm going to choose the other writing for Shikigami, and use another reading," Megumi answers. He cares little for whatever name he chooses unlike Kugisaki who had stayed up last night with the lights on, scribbling various Kanji combinations that she deems the 'best'. "Probably Shokushin."

Kugisaki snorts. "You're surprisingly good at this, Fushiguro. Is this a late chuunibyou awakening?"

Megumi only glares at her.

She stands up, resorting to returning to her practice in holding back. She flips her toy hammer in the hair, expertly catching it in her palms. She almost looks like she can be a capable knife user because of how skillful she wields the weapon. Megumi has never seen her with any other weapon though. "I'm settling with something simple," before Megumi can comment on this, she continues, "But an English name is a lot cooler than a Japanese one, don't you think?"

"What is it?" Megumi sighs.

"Voodoo!"

Megumi sighs again. "That name only applies to the most dangerous aspect of your technique. You do know that, right?"

Kugisaki rolls her eyes. "What do you want me to choose? Nail Manipulation? Whack-a-Mole? How about I whack you instead?" With a sudden tug on her small armory by her waist, nails appear right between her fingers. She lets go of them and as fast as she does, she slams her toy hammer to the apex of her nails. It embeds right to the ground, glimmering with faint Cursed Energy before it disappears. "My aims going to get bad the more we stay here. There's nothing to use as target practice."

"Then just get cans. We're in Dagobah Beach, Kugisaki. We have everything here."

"I'm not touching trash that's been here for who knows how long," Kugisaki hisses, "How about you run around and I aim at you?"

Megumi mimics her annoyed expression. He puts his hands together. He feels his shadow twitch, his most favored Ten Shadows rising from its dark color. Gyokuken appear, barking once before looking at Kugisaki who seems surprised at their arrival. "You can tell them to grab cans. Just don't hit them," he stresses out.

Kugisaki raises a single eyebrow. She puts a hand on her waist cockily. "I'm only second to Maki-san when it comes to aiming, Fushiguro. I hope you didn't forget that," she chirps and begins to walk away with the twin dogs.

Megumi refocuses on his notebook containing his accumulated notes from both the history and the culture surrounding Quirks. Surprisingly, most of the reliable information come from the blogs that support anti-Pro-Heroes, which Megumi supposes he should not be focusing on. Sugiyama-san gladly handed his grandson's old textbooks to Megumi and Kugisaki when they asked, containing little to no answers or even side notes. ("He was never a good student," was only what Yuriko-san said.) As expected, the textbooks are missing too many subjects that Megumi found from random conspiracy and theory blogs online: like the mysterious incident that occurred a few years ago that brought upon what the blog now calls as 'The Secret of Osaka' that allegedly involved All Might defeating a very powerful villain whose name was never mentioned no matter where Megumi looks.

What is stranger is that there are little to no information about what happened in Osaka that time, only that All Might and other Pro-Heroes engaged in a raid in Osaka and a few weeks later, he battled a villain that was so strong that even he sustained heavy injuries. And that's it. There are no other information aside from that. Osaka. All Might. Heavy injuries. Mysterious Villain who no one knows about. But despite the overwhelming curiosity that plagues Megumi, he decides to put it down, ignore it. He does not need this information nor does it help him in passing UA. He tells himself that he only has two goals: find Itadori and get back home to his sister. That's it. Whatever happens to this world is something he can no longer control because it is not his.

He looks up the moment he hears a faint noise in front of him. His hands click to meet one another but stops mid-way when he sees Kugisaki with an unsure look, one hand in front of her face apologetically. "Megumi-kun!" Fushiguro furrows his eyebrows at the sudden use of his given name. He still cannot get used to it no matter how much Kugisaki says it in front of the Sugiyama Couple and even Fushiguro struggles painfully to call Kugisaki by hers too. ("Geh. Not everybody can be Gojou-sensei who simply doesn't care about surnames," Kugisaki had complained.)

Beside Kugisaki is a man around her weight, looking as if he is decaying and definitely should not be walking around with his boney figure. Fushiguro looks at Kugisaki disbelievingly. Where did she pick up that guy this time?

"Do you still have the snacks that Sugiyama-san gave us—"

"Young lady, you don't need to do that!"

Kugisaki swerves to the man's direction, pointing accusingly to his face. "You do know that you look like you're going to die after one gust of wind, right?" The man flinches, looking surprisingly offended by her words. "Anyway, it's honestly alright. I almost injured you earlier—"

"You almost what?" Megumi grabs her wrist.

With a soft push, Megumi lets go of her. "I was training and then he—" Kugisaki pushes a thumb to the man's direction. The man bows shallowly to Megumi, which he returns with an awkward one. "—suddenly showed up out of nowhere. Next thing I know, instincts kicked in. I thought some pervert was watching me."

The man turns to her in aghast. "I am not!"

"Yeah, yeah," Kugisaki rubs the back of her head, "That's why I'm apologizing. Anyway, here: we only managed to snag some of the Maito Konpēto. Everyone likes it anyway."

The man awkwardly takes the package of sweets. Kugisaki, though actively conveying her annoyance for the sweets, was actually the one to take them, even saying that it was a sin because of how good it tastes. Megumi avoids it as much as possible, deciding that it is not the taste he can ever grow to like. (Kugisaki looked at him in disbelief.) "Thank you—ah," the man lowers his head, "I am Yagi Toshinori. That was rude of me to not introduce myself."

Kugisaki shrugs. "Kugisaki Nobara and this is Fushiguro Megumi," Megumi glares at her immediately, trying his best to send a message to her with his eyes: Why are we with this guy? Kugisaki averts her gaze somewhere else.

"You said you were training, yes?" Yagi asks. "Is it for UA?"

This time, Kugisaki lets her gaze meet Megumi's. She grins. Megumi really, really cannot get a good read on her sometimes. "Yup! Every country bumpkin dreams of UA, you know, Yagi-san," she exclaims.

Kugisaki engraves herself to this world seamlessly, contrasting Megumi who still finds himself uncomfortable with people who have mutant quirks, unlike Megumi who only knows how to talk with his fists and with a realistic, rational perspective, unlike Megumi who cannot lie as easily as Kugisaki who was meant to be His Cursed Energy bottles up, only getting released when he summoned Gyokuken just like Kugisaki who began to twitch every now and then at the discomfort of bottled-up energy.

Yagi glances at the two dogs flanking Kugisaki's sides. Megumi feels their agitation before the man, through the connection he has with his precious shikigami. "Is this Kugisaki-shoujo's Quirk?" He gestures to Gyokuken.

The twin dogs growl lowly. Kugisaki crouches down to their height, rubbing their necks and their stomachs. "It's Megumi-kun's," she answers. Her face shifts to that of curiosity a little too easily. She puts both of her elbows on her knees, leaning her face against them. "Speaking of, can Yagi-san give us a tip about UA?—" She giggles, pushing a strand of hair to the back of her ear. Megumi almost rolls his eyes at the painfully obvious act. "Yagi-san has been in Musutafu longer than us, right?"

Yagi nods eagerly. He seems enthusiastic to help Kugisaki but Megumi finds this to be rather suspicious. Old men taking their time in talking to minors is always suspicious for Megumi. He remembers getting an earful from Tsumiki when he came home with the then mysterious Gojou Satoru. He scoots a little closer to Kugisaki, his Gyokuken ready to pounce if anything happens.

"All you must remember is that true heroism does not rely on—"

"Defeating villains," Megumi ends.

His eyes meet Yagi for a moment. Kugisaki expertly steers the underlying tension. She stands up, making sure to step on Megumi's foot as discreetly as possible. "That's what Nezu-sensei is always saying, right?" She stretches her arms. "The next time you see us, it's going to be in the big screens! And—" The Gyokuken's head suddenly turns to another direction, their growls heavy and wary to whoever has appeared. A boy shuffles behind the mounts and mounts of trash, curled dark green hair sticking to his skin because of sweat. Megumi's frown deepens when the boy drops a large broken television out of nowhere.

"All—Ya—Yagi-san!" The boy shrieks. He bows his head as low as he can. "I'm sorry for interrupting your conversation!"

Megumi reaches out to pacify his twin dogs. Yagi only beams. "This is Midoriya-shounen!" He eagerly introduces the boy to the two, even dragging him to their side. Megumi glances at Kugisaki, mentally asking her if she planned this out. Kugisaki sweatdrops. Definitely not then. "He, too, will enter UA! I'm the one training him as of now."

Training? Megumi thinks.

Kugisaki grimaces.

She quickly puts on a smile, the frown vanishing as fast as it appeared. "Nice to meet you! Kugisaki, by the way, and this is Fushiguro," this time, she puts a boundary between their two groups. Before 'Midoriya' can even say anything, Kugisaki gasps. "I still have an errand to do! Megumi, can you come with me?"

Megumi picks up her cue and stands. "Sure," with a wave of his hand, the twin dogs melt back to his shadows, "It was a pleasure to meet you, Midoriya-kun, Yagi-san."

"See you next time!" Kugisaki rushes away.

When they finally reach a place far enough for the beach to vanish from their sights, Kugisaki groans. She threads her fingers through her hair. "How could I have known that a bag of bones was training someone to enter UA?" She demands, more to herself than to Megumi who keeps silent. "Have you seen the kid's arms? He may as well be best friends with that guy from Kyoto and Itadori! What the hell are they eating?"

Megumi hums. "There are more than thousands upon thousands of examinees in UA each year and out of those examinees, only forty will pass. I doubt we will be seeing any time soon. He looked... too plain to be a Pro-Hero-in-training," he points out.

"You can't just assume that! I only approached the guy to get more connections. He was a bag of bones! At most, I thought he was a creep," Kugisaki crouches to the ground all of the sudden. She buries her face in her hands. "I swear, Fushiguro, if that guy passes, I'm going to scream. We need as little connections as possible with the people we're going to be classmates with. It's different for the people outside of class—" She sighs exhaustedly and suddenly collapses to the ground when Megumi kicks her from behind. She snaps her head to Megumi. "What the hell, 'shiguro?!"

"If that guy passes, we'll just keep him as acquaintainces. Besides, we don't really need to build friendships with them," Megumi pulls Kugisaki up aggressively, "It's just like any other mission. Just a longer one. More complicated one. More stressful. More research. More—" He cringes. "It's just another mission, Kugisaki. We have each other." He cringes again. He sighs, covering his face with his free hand.

"We have each other," Kugisaki mimics in an exaggerated deep voice. Megumi shoves her as she throws her head back in laughter. She clutches her stomach. "You suck at pep talk, Fushiguro."

Megumi stares at her back when she begins walking ahead. "You know, you can call me by my given name," he says.

Kugisaki stops. She tilts her head and Megumi cannot see her face. He does not know what to feel about that. But when she faces him, she still looks like Kugisaki. "Me-gu-mi," she tries his name on her lips and scoffs. "I get to decide when I call you by your given name. For now, you're Fushiguro."

Megumi shakes his head. "Whatever."

"By the way, I also get to decide when you call me Nobara."

Megumi becomes tempted to punch Kugisaki right then and there.

・ shiritsu (私立) means private. japanese private schools are addressed as such. megumi is said to have gone to saitama shiritsu urami higashi chuugakkou.

・ question of the chapter: would you rather be a jujutsu sorcerer or a pro-hero?

・ answer: pro-heroes have a higher survival rate but at the same time, i prefer to be a sorcerer since i really can't stand the pro-hero society.

the winds of tomorrow will blow