Fushiguro, Itadori and Kugisaki weren't the best for the job anymore, but the world had too few jujutsu sorcerers and the three were used to being sent out to hunt all kind of curses all over the city by now. Fortunately, most intel they got nowadays was reliable thanks to Nanami's influence.
Today's curse was classified as a second-grade that had evaded exorcism through cleverly shifting between the sewers and abandoned buildings in proximity of its point of origin. Tracking it down and pinpointing its exact location had been a hassle that many jujutsu sorcerers just didn't have the time for. But people were dying because of it. And Yuuji had asked why he, Megumi, and Nobara couldn't go exorcise it by themselves.
After a moment of staring back intensely at Yuuji, Nanami had sighed and agreed that, while it wasn't pure exercise because it was still a dangerous task, they could put everything else on hold and go - under one condition.
"If you run across any kind of trouble, I want you to tell me at once."
Well …
"Is that … the second-grade? Hah? It's kinda small." Nobara leaned forward to peer down on the angrily trembling orange dog-like curse on the pavement in front of them. The fur-ball with a chainsaw instead of a nose growled at them in a threatening but also cute manner, clearly standing in their way.
"Probably not." Megumi ran a hand through his hair with a look around and sighed. His divine dogs were scouting the area somewhere ahead of the three to find the elusive curse; but this cursed spirit in front of them didn't seem related to their target. Apart from growling intimidatingly, it also didn't seem to want to attack them. If Megumi didn't know better, he'd think that it was trying to stall time. But what for?
"It's actually kinda cute if you ask me." Yuuji crouched down and extended a hand despite Megumi's warning to be careful and Nobara's lifting her hammer and nails in case she needed to step in. By now, Yuuji trusted that the dog-like curse was no danger to them.
"What's up, little guy?" Yuuji asked nicely, but the orange curse jumped back with another growl, keeping out of grabbing range. It looked a little worn-down and worse to the wear, Yuuji thought, and pat down his clothes in search for something edible, which he sadly didn't have on him.
At that moment, Megumi's divine dogs returned to his side as quietly as shadows and pressed left and right to his legs. They froze at the same time as Megumi ran his hands between their ears with a frown, heads turned to the orange curse, fixating it with suddenly pinned-back ears as if just now sensing its presence.
Likewise, the cursed spirit started evading backwards, pressing closer to the pavement, growling less frequently while Megumi's dogs tensed, waiting for the order to pounce on it.
"Let's just leave this one." Yuuji angled his head to look up to his friends and their weary expressions, stood up and evened out the wrinkles in his school uniform. He really didn't want to do this today.
"If we exorcise it, we won't regret it later," Nobara argued but still swung her hammer around to rest the blunt end against her shoulder.
"We came here for the second-grade, remember? And the little guy here, he -"
"Pochita!" A scream coming from the abandoned building site to their left interrupted Yuuji and made five heads turn to a gap in the metallic fence. The orange curse gave a bark in answer to the scream, resulting in another shout. "Pochita, where are you?!"
Someone came stumbling out of the abandoned building heavily panting, skittered over the gravel in front of the building site and finally hit against the metallic fence from the other side. For the watching group, first a bloodied hand at the solid fence's edge came into sight, then a head with blond scruffy hair in complete disarray.
A teenager stumbled forward, clothes and body completely covered in blood and gore, and dropped to his knees in front of the curse he'd called Pochita. He wrapped his arms around it with a relieved kind of laughter and rubbed his face against its side, and the curse wiggled and made happy noises just like a regular dog.
"A civilian?" Nobara asked under her breath but apparently loud enough for the teenager to notice the little group standing there. He looked up with an "Oh." that illuminated his entire bloody face, but when he spotted Megumi's shikigami, he furrowed his brows suddenly angry.
"Those dogs scared the living crap out of me!" he said with an accusing finger and got up as the group exchanged alarmed glances. "Nearly got me killed too! What's up with you lot anyways? What's a bunch of highschoolers want with a place like this? Just warning you, the bounty's mine!"
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"A civilian defeated a second-grade curse?" Nanami repeated Yuuji's last words incredulously. Yuuji pressed the mobile phone closer to his ear and lowered his voice so that he wouldn't be overheard by the group in some distance.
"Yeah, that's what I said, Nanamin. His name is Denji. He's currently talking with Fushiguro and Kugisaki at our point of interest." Yuuji looked at the curse named Pochita who was pressed against Denji's leg and scowled at the group as if to say that he was still there to protect Denji.
"And there's Pochita, a curse spirit who helps him with … devil hunting," Yuuji added slowly.
From the ongoing silence on the other side of the line he could roughly imagine what was going through Nanami's head because Yuuji too had heard stories about certain jujutsu sorcerers who had special relationships with curses. In general, the situation was far from usual.
"Hold him there until I arrive," Nanami instructed, waited for Yuuji's affirmation, and terminated the call, most likely already on the way to meet them. Yuuji stared at his phone, then packed it away and re-joined his friends, letting them know with a nod that Nanami was coming.
Despite being roughly their age, Denji seemed awkward around them, especially around Nobara - to the point where she gave an irritated tsk and said she was going to get hold of some fast food for them all before stalking off to get some burgers and fries. She went alone, obviously not in want for company.
"Did I piss her off?" Denji asked apprehensively, by then seated on a low box with Pochita on his knees, fingers in constant motion. He had to turn his head a lot to keep both Yuuji and Megumi in sight because of the eyepatch covering one of his eyes, maybe an injury from devil hunting? Yuuji couldn't be sure because he was quite new to all of this as well. Yet, judging from Megumi's dry questions, it wasn't all too common for non-sorcerers to exorcise cursed spirits. Especially that high-levelled for someone without cursed energy.
"Not really. I guess." Megumi stopped looking after Nobara when she disappeared in direction of the main road and refocused on the big mystery that was Denji in front of him.
During their scouting earlier, his shikigami wolves had told him that there was a human in the abandoned building and Megumi had assumed it might be a victim, maybe a hostage if the second-grade curse had been smart enough for that; and with Denji stumbling out to find Pochita, he'd initially thought that the blood covering the boy was the boy's.
Everything seemed to be wrong. Not that it bothered Yuuji.
"Can I pet him?" Yuuji was crouching next to Denji, pointing at Pochita again who eyed him wearily but didn't move away or growl this time. Yuuji had that wide smile plastered along his face, his genuine enthusiasm back in place, the same one that landed him friends left and right. Denji himself might not even notice Yuuji's influence on himself when he answered.
"Eh? Yeah sure, if Pochita allows it?" Denji retracted his hands around his pet, and Megumi watched the child-like joy on Yuuji's face intensify when he got to pet Pochita. He looked like that one time when he and Nobara had their caresses with Megumi's shadow wolves. Heh.
"Who's a good boy?" Yuuji said, laughing, and Pochita even closed his eyes, clearly enjoying himself. "You know, you remind me of the principal's cursed corpse I watched movies with but without the ugly. You're so cute and adorable!"
"Hey!" At this moment Nobara returned, loaded with paper bags filled with fast food. She still managed to point a finger at them accusingly, barking: "Why are you having fun when I have to do all the work? Get your asses over here, chop chop!"
"Yeah yeah," Megumi grumbled but walked over to take most of the paper bags to carry. Not that they were heavy or anything, just for the message.
It turned out that both Denji and Pochita were actually starving, and they showed it by how they shovelled the food into them without the time to take a breather. Impressive how Denji could bite off half a burger and push a handful of fries in extra.
"Take your time. It's not going to run away," Nobara said pointedly, picked up a fry and offered it to Pochita. "So, you hunt curses for fun?"
"Not fun. I'm in debt." Denji said between bites, somehow managing not to drop any food from his mouth while talking. "The job pays well."
"Does it now?" At this, Yuuji tilted his head, his own burger forgotten in hands. He stared into the distance, trying to recall the last time somebody had paid him for exorcising spirits. If he wasn't mistaken, Gojo deposited money to higher-ranked sorcerers from time to time, but Megumi, Nobara and he barely got pocket money …
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[An additional thought that can or cannot be connected with the story above. I was thinking about the trio discovering Denji in the warehouse after I watched episode 1.]
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The warehouse which the cursed spirit was supposedly in was too quiet. According to intel, the unclassified spirit was surrounded by a group of zombies it had turned humans into and thus might pose a real threat to even highly capable jujutsu sorcerers.
But there was no trace of that when Yuuji, Nobara, and Megumi approached the warehouse. The gates were wide open, the area deserted. Worse yet, blood splatters and limbs decorated the ground like a sick joke. The stench of blood and dead was predominant in the air, the silence eerily heavy.
What had happened here?
Standing at the entrance to the warehouse with his friends facing the opposite side, Yuuji squinted into the darkness, trying to make out any shapes inside. The cursed spirit had to be inside. But inside were only more corpses, more limbs, more gore.
"Ew, it stinks," Nobara complained and wrinkled her nose, suppressing a cough. Whatever they had been chasing seemed to be long gone.
"Someone's inside," Yuuji suddenly said. His eyes adjusting to the changed lighting inside, he could barely make out the figure at the end of the warehouse, simply standing there. A shirt that had once been white, dark trousers, motionless.
"The curse?" Nobara asked, but Yuuji shook his head. He beckoned his friends to follow and entered, careful where he placed his feet and also not to avert his eyes from the only standing figure in the entire area. From up closer Yuuji could see that the person had chainsaws in his arms, and his head was that of a curse … probably.
Anyway, it wasn't the curse they had come here for. In fact, the corpse of the cursed spirit was severed in proximity, cleanly dealt with. From the state of things, the … chainsaw man standing here had to be the one who had done all of this.
"What are you …?" Nobara approached and poked the body with the end of her hammer, ready to jump back out of reach if the person moved. When the chainsaw man lifted his head at the touch, Megumi and Yuuji immediately readied their hands to use their cursed technique, but all the chainsaw man did was say: "Hug me."
"Uh …" Nobara exchanged a glance with the others, unsure what to do. She felt like the situation she was in was as dangerous as the stench of death was thick in the air. But the chainsaw man did nothing else but sway back and forth and Nobara was backed up by her friends, so in the end she said: "Okay?"
As if relieved at that, the chainsaw man sank forward and fell against Nobara who caught him with a little scream, fully ready to kick-drop the guy to the ground and end him if it turned out to be an attack. However, the demonic features of said guy melted away in some sort of goo and revealed a pale, blond guy underneath all that.