chapter 13: the fallen
tw: terrible coping mechanisms, self-harm, grieving, psychopathic tendencies, misogyny, assault, and typical behavior from zen'in naoya who is the biggest shit ever
No matter how much Satoru wants to, he cannot enjoy alcohol the way Shouko and Suguru seem to. The agreeable, clouded state that alcohol perfects for them is ridiculously difficult for Satoru to achieve; he often overshoots it, grasping that sensation for only a few minutes before hurtling back to sobriety or uncontrollable nausea. The hangovers that follow seem disproportionately more frequent or worse as well. It takes Satoru only a couple cups of sake to have a splitting headache the next day that is only exacerbated by the pounding pulse of his Six Eyes. Satoru, unable to truly understand the appeal of inebriation, had decided that alcohol was not worth it.
Now, though, Satoru understands. He is one with the clouds, his mind is light and airy, and he feels nothing but the pleasantness of the world and its newfound weightlessness. It is a testament to Satoru's power that he is not completely incapacitated by this state, that he had the presence of mind to—what had he done again? Ah, yes, in a matter of hours, he had mastered not only positive Cursed Energy, Red, but also the secret technique of Hollow Purple and torn off that Zen'in man's arm and killed him. Satoru is incredible. He is blessed. He is holy, and at this moment, he is Infinite.
Other humans must mire through the sluggishness of the world, but Satoru does not feel it. He descends the steps into this unmarked building, not entirely sure why, but letting his feet carry him forward. He is supposed to do something. He is supposed to feel something. Something bad and tragic had happened, right? He was supposed to protect someone, and then he'd been stabbed in the throat, and his chest, and his leg, and then in his head—yes, that was bad, that was very bad. Someone had died, right? That is bad, too. He thinks? Maybe it was him, maybe Satoru had died, and whoever is walking in his body now is not-Satoru.
The stairs lead him to an underground atrium, where humans gather like rats in a sewer system, and they see him: tall, holy, ordained in blood, but his cerulean eyes and his bright white hair glow amidst the rabble, and they applaud. A god has answered the call, has accepted the sacrifice they have offered: a young girl, sacred at birth, baptized in the blue cool light of an aquarium in Okinawa. The sea of vermin parts for their god, who touches none of them, whose feet do not even deign to touch the filthy floor, whose lungs inhale air filtered by Infinity. He finds their sacrifice on the floor, covered in white cloth. The silhouette is clear enough.
Amanai. That's right, he was supposed to protect Amanai. He's supposed to feel bad, but he doesn't. He bends down and picks her up. The crowd around him applauds, cheers, worships him, but he can't even muster the energy to be disgusted. His mind is elsewhere. His ears are stuffed with cotton. He hears a familiar hum in his head, he feels a familiar hunger in his gut, and these are the things that break through his high—he wants it back, he wants to feel that weightlessness again, maybe if he devours all these souls around him, it will satiate his appetite and maybe that is what he has been wanting this whole time: all the pleasantness of the world, unencumbered.
Amanai's body is a feather. He was supposed to protect her. There had been someone else too, right? His cotton-stuffed mind is trapped in tacky gears. He is supposed to feel bad. He was stabbed in the throat, in the head. Amanai had died. There had been someone else, something had happened to someone else, too. He's understanding, he's remembering, there had been someone else—
Oh, that's right.
"You're late, Suguru," he hears himself say. "Or maybe you're early. This cult owns so many buildings in this city, after all."
Suguru steps closer, uncertainty lining his face. "You are Satoru, right?"
No, not-Satoru wants to answer, I'm greater than Satoru. I am the Honored One. I have devoured Satoru, his empty heart and his worthless soul, he who boasted being the Strongest but who could not even protect his charge and his…
Suguru looks okay. He looks alive. He looks…
Something sharp and potent pierces through the cotton, through the weightlessness, and it is stronger than either the hum or the hunger.
"You went to Shouko already?"
"Yeah. I'm fine." Suguru glances down at Amanai's hand swinging lifelessly under the sheet. "Not that…that matters."
The look on his face makes not-Satoru recede, and Satoru with his empty heart that is slowly filling with something that is stronger than hum or hunger surfaces.
"I messed up. It wasn't your fault."
Suguru shakes his head. "Come on, let's go back."
"Suguru." The Honored One is laughing gleefully in the back of Satoru's cotton-filled mind. "Should we kill these guys?" The rats clap, and the hunger gnaws widely, and Satoru wants, he wants, he wants—he is dead, but not-Satoru is alive and giddy—
"If we do it now," The Honored One says, "I probably won't feel a thing."
"Nah." Suguru reaches for him, but doesn't touch. "There's only non-sorcerers here. There's no meaning."
"Meaning," echoes the Honored One. "Is that really necessary?"
Suguru's hand lands on his shoulder, and Satoru—it is Satoru, he's undead—lets him touch. The Honored One snarls but fades away. The hunger is back but so is Satoru, hum and hunger, empty heart and worthless soul, only because he is with Suguru.
"It's very necessary," Suguru pulls him close, "especially for shamans."
They walk out of the sewers, away from the rats and trash and into the bright afternoon sunlight, arms laden with bloody sacrifice. Satoru lets Suguru guide him, his mind is still fuzzy, his ears buzzing with silence. The hum that belongs only to Satoru grows louder as they walk for what feels like hours, but the sun has only started to set when they find Yuna. The hum suddenly swells.
"Sensei," says Suguru.
Yuna turns around and her red-rimmed eyes lock onto Satoru. She does not even look at Amanai.
"Gojou-kun."
She rushes to him and brings a hand up to his cheek, but she just hovers over his skin, as if she's afraid to touch."You're okay," she whispers.
"I'm fine," says Satoru. The hum has become an angry trill. He looks past Yuna, at the mutilated body behind her of a man whose arm and torso had been torn off completely by Satoru-not-Satoru. His head is ringing. He's remembering. There's something else, there's something important that he was supposed to feel bad about but doesn't—
Ask your teacher.
Satoru looks at his teacher, her blouse drenched in blood, (whose blood?), her eyes wet with tears (for him? Or for the man behind her?).
He should kill her. There is something wrong and Satoru knows it is because of her, because of the man behind her, he doesn't know what it is but he knows—
"Gojou-kun." Yuna's palm touches his face, and at first Infinity resists, but then dissipates. The hum in his ears does, too, as Satoru wants to dive into her comfort, wants Yuna to hold him but doesn't know how to ask. "I'm so sorry."
He believes her, because he does not think he can stand it if he doesn't.
"I'm fine," he says again.
"Okay. Okay." Yuna cradles his cheek in her hand. "Let's get you both home."
She squeezes his hand gently, reaches for Suguru and pats him on the shoulder, before turning around and calling for an auxiliary manager to pick them up. Suguru brings his arm around Satoru's shoulder like he is precious, the way you would hold an infant, not the way you would revere a god.
This earth is godforsaken, but they are at least on it together.
Ask your teacher, echoes the corpse meters away.
Satoru doesn't. He doesn't want to. He doesn't care. He's tired, and he just wants to go home.
She needs to stop watching. The clock reads one in the morning. Yuna is so tired, but she has not slept in days.
She ignores the burn in her eyes and hits the Play button again. The security footage starts when the students arrive at the top of Mount Mushiro. Toji appears out of shadows like a shikigami. At this point, Yuna has memorized the sequence of events: he stabs through Satoru, is eaten by Suguru's dragon Curse, only to tear through it with ease while Suguru escapes with Amanai, and then only Satoru and Toji remain.
Toji is a monster. There's no other word to describe it. His years of combat experience make Satoru appear like the sixteen-year-old child he is, not a god propped up by the jujutsu world, and he shreds through Satoru's defense like it's made of washi paper. Every move Toji makes is so calculated, so methodical, from escaping Satoru's Maximum Blue to releasing the swarm of Flyheads to—Yuna's stomach flips each time she watches this part—the dagger crushing Satoru's throat, the slash through his torso, the stab stab stab of Satoru's leg and then the last stab through Satoru's head as he falls. It's definitive but effortless, as if Toji's checking off a task because it's expected but not necessary. This is not Toji fighting mindlessly, like a feral animal with the singular thought to kill indiscriminately—no, this is Toji at his most intelligent self, at maximal brutality, who knows exactly who his opponent was, who has planned every step necessary to dispose of this sixteen-year-old prodigy.
As Satoru's blood pools around his feet, Toji's eyes find the security camera, and he grins directly at it.
Yuna grabs the wastebasket next to her desk and hurls, but nothing comes up except stomach acid. Her throat burns, she blinks tears out of her eyes, and she gags. It has become a pattern.
"He was a top-tier assassin, Yuna," Yaga had said the first time they'd watched the footage, when Yuna had vomited in front of him. "He was known as the Sorcerer Killer—this was his thing. He was born without any Cursed Energy. There's no way your Barriers could have stopped him. Nothing could have beyond a Gojou Satoru fully awakened."
Yuna swallows down any remnant bile in her mouth and sits up. She presses her eyes into the palms of her hands and takes in one shaky breath, then two.
She has probably watched the footage a thousand times at this point. The last moments of Toji's life, spent cutting down a child.
She has not shown the footage to the students. Yaga had asked her to destroy it—apparently, the Zen'ins want it—but Yuna cannot bring herself to do so. She keeps replaying it, a perverse self-flagellation known only to herself. Yaga had asked her this morning if she needed to take time off. She feels ridiculous—she is not the one who needs comforting, the priority should be the students—but Yaga thinks the students seem fine.
Of course they do. Satoru laughs at Kento and Suguru chuckles quietly alongside him and Shouko just watches them exasperatedly like she's not sure what to do with them. But when classes are over, they lounge in the room while Yuna cleans up, Satoru absentmindedly rubs his forehead or throat where Toji had stabbed him through and Suguru keeps glancing at Satoru every minute like he's making sure he's alive. Their fingers interlace even while Yuna is lecturing and Shouko doesn't roll her eyes at them.
It has only been a week. Of course they are not fine.
Yuna is not fine, either. The last night she'd slept was beside a man who murdered a fourteen-year-old girl the day after.
Whenever Yuna closes her eyes, she sees Suguru's bleeding body. She sees Toji killing Satoru. She sees Toji's corpse, mangled and dismembered, before she'd doused it in gasoline and lit it aflame. She'd called an auxiliary manager to pick up Suguru and Satoru and had instructed the manager to bring her a tub of gasoline and matches. After ensuring her students were back in the School, she'd cast a Curtain and burned Toji's body where it'd fallen. She was not strong enough to move it herself, and she did not trust anyone else to do it for her. Toji was a specimen. She could not risk anyone—Yuki, the Zen'ins, the Jujutsu Higher-Ups—mutilating his body any further.
She saved his ashes to dispose of herself, not out of respect—he deserved none of that—but out of fear. Who knew what Techniques would allow for his resurrection, if a séance Technique would require his bones. She could not afford it. The ashes sit in a sealed urn underneath Yuna's bed, and once in a while she will catch a whiff of something that smells like Toji, sharp and smoky, and she will yearn—no, she does not yearn for him, she was betrayed and she hates him—how fucking dare he—
So no, Yuna has not slept, and she is not fine.
She closes her laptop, takes a new pack of cigarettes from her desk, and heads to the overlook near the koi pond. It is her favorite place on campus, especially in the late hours of the night. Gone are the days when Yuna could boast of sleeping through any circumstance. She has spent the last several nights by herself on the deck, lost in thought, looking up at the starry sky and thinning crescent of the moon. She has contemplated drowning herself in the koi pond. It is more and more tempting with every passing night.
Yuna takes a seat against the red-gilded railings and lights her cigarette. She takes a moment to herself, letting her bare feet dangle in the water, as she takes several deep drags before reaching into her bag and withdrawing a small, sheathed dagger.
She had never fully sealed Nightmare's Whim. She can't really explain why; perhaps some part of her was smart after all, to think she may need to use it against Toji one day, but even in her most irritated moments with him, the thought had never crossed her mind. She remembers the way Toji had looked when it was buried in him—his expression taut and pained, the only time she'd had seen him express anything beyond his brazen confidence in his own strength and evilness, in the cruelty of the world. (She does not count the times he was gentle with her, the times his dark eyes softened, because they were not real, because they were born out of her dreams and her stupidity).
Yuna takes a deep breath, lifts up her blouse, and sinks the dagger into her abdomen. The demon head gapes at her in the moonlight, crowing silently in glee as the weapon burrows into her skin and the Curse markings spread across her stomach. A now familiar pain erupts over her body, and Yuna lies flat on her back, cigarette gritted in her teeth as she closes her eyes to stabilize her breathing. When she reopens them, he's there, and Yuna's heart bleeds.
"Again, hummingbird?" Toji's bloody face grins above hers. He's missing his left arm, most of his torso, and his intestines spill out of the gaping hole blown through his body. "You must really miss me."
"I don't miss you," she thinks.
"You've never been a good liar."
"I'm a phenomenal liar. The key is tricking people into thinking you're a bad one."
"You've never been a good liar with me." Toji sits down next to her. He smells like burnt incense and rotting flesh. Yuna is always nauseous lately. "So we're just going to keep doing this every night?"
"You won't let me sleep anyway."
"Because all you can see is me killing your Gojou heir over and over again?" he cackles. "So what, you'd rather hallucinate instead?"
"I can punish myself in multiple ways."
"That you can, hummingbird. You're right, you're a phenomenal liar."
She doesn't answer, just smokes her cigarette and lets the dagger do its job. A thin layer of sweat covers her skin. She feels like she's burning alive.
"It's not enough, though," comments Toji. He lies down next to her, and his bloody face rests on her shoulder. His stench fills her nostrils and acid bubbles in her throat. "It won't ever be enough. You let me in, hummingbird. You told me I could enter the School's Barriers, no problem. You should've gone to Saitama earlier instead of spending that night fucking me." Toji laughs in her ear. His arm curls around her abdomen and presses down on the dagger, hard, and Yuna chokes on her smoke and more. "You should've never believed me."
"I know."
"Do you?" he sneers. His fingernails dig through her skin, puncturing through her guts and reaching deep inside her as if he's searching for a soul to amputate. "I don't think you do. You're not doing this to punish yourself, hummingbird. You miss me. You still want me. You're wet for me."
He reaches through her and finds proof, his fingers thrusting through her walls and Yuna screams in her head as he pulls through her organs to do so. Toji pulls away and just laughs.
"No one except me knows just how disgusting you really are, huh?" He leers close so that his blood drips onto her face. "Pathetic. At least in this form, I can hurt you, binding vows be damned. Though I guess it's the same as before. You want it, after all. You deserve it."
"I know," she whispers. She hates him so much, she hates herself more, because all Yuna wants to do is kiss that scar at his mouth. Tears slide down her cheeks, and Toji licks them away.
"Don't cry for me, hummingbird. They'll find out about us if you do, and then they'll kill you. How will you pay back your students if you're dead?"
She turns toward him, his dark green eyes glittering like scales, the blood matting his hair.
"How could you do this to me?" She does not say this aloud, but this Toji is one with her mind and does not need her to say her careful words to know what she believes.
"How did you think I wouldn't, you stupid bitch? I told you every step of the way. I never lied about who I am. Don't blame me for not living up to your expectations."
"I know."
"I don't think you do. Why would you still miss me if you did?"
Yuna pushes Cursed Energy into Nightmare's Whim and it releases, but only after it rebounds with a second of exponential pain that leaves her sobbing. The warmth of Toji's hallucination—no matter how horrid and foul and evil it was—is gone. When Yuna opens her eyes, her cigarette has fallen to the side, its red butt glowing against the polished deck. Nightmare's Whim purrs in satisfaction.
Yuna sheathes the Cursed Weapon, picks up her cigarette, and resumes smoking. She brushes aside her tears and stays there all night, alone, waiting for the sun to rise.
"Absolutely not."
Yaga's silhouette looks like it is rubbing his forehead. "It's not your call, Morimoto."
"I am their teacher, it is my call. The second-years are grounded from missions until I say they are safe to return to the field."
"Look," sighs Yaga, "I know what you're trying to do, and I respect it. It's why I haven't given them any missions since everything happened, but this is a Special Grade mission that we need a Special Grade sorcerer for—"
"Call Yuki-san then."
"You know that bum won't answer."
"Too bad."
"Morimoto," Yaga raises his voice, but Yuna must be making a face, for they pause their conversation briefly.
The principal and teacher are in the hallway, right outside the second-year classroom. For the last week, Yuna has combined her two classes; she looks too tired to make two separate lesson plans these days, and her second-years are not in the headspace to learn anyway. Yaga had interrupted a review of geographic distribution of Cursed Techniques around the world to pull Satoru away for a new mission. Before Satoru could accept, Yuna had intervened, and now the two teachers are outside in the hallway, arguing in hushed voices as if the students have suddenly gone blind, deaf, and dumb.
"Innocent people are dying," Yaga hisses.
"Let them," says Yuna.
Suguru shoots a look at Satoru, who looks at Shouko, who shrugs. Yuu appears floridly anxious at the idea of innocent people dying and has resorted to tracing over his notes, while Kento looks like he wishes he'd skipped class. Outside, the sun beats and a woodpecker pecks and the scent of roses lilts. Satoru feels, hears, smells none of it.
"Do you hear yourself, Morimoto?"
"People die everyday. They are not worth a Special Grade sorcerer dying. Do you know how many more people will die if Gojou-kun dies? He's not going."
"Shouko cleared him—"
"He was stabbed in the head!" Yuna snaps, and all the students stiffen, because when had Yuna ever snapped? "He was stabbed in the throat, then slashed through his torso, then stabbed through his leg three times and then in the head! I do not care if he is cleared physically—he is not going."
Suguru squeezes Satoru's hand tightly, and Satoru squeezes back. How does Yuna know exactly how many times Satoru was stabbed, anyway? He hasn't told anyone.
Yaga pauses. "We don't have another option."
Yuna laughs hysterically, and it makes all of them cringe. "Who told you that, all the Special Grade Ones of the Three Great Families? The ones who hide in their compounds and let underage children get massacred by a man they exiled?"
Yuna has let her voice get too loud. The three second-years walk to the door and slide it open, reminding the teachers that they're there. Satoru shuffles to the front, hands tucked in his pockets.
"I'm fine, sensei, I can go—"
"No," she says coldly. "Tell the Three Great Families to send their own Special Grade One sorcerer. If they're so frightened, tell them I'll go with them and will give them a Miracle."
Yaga opens his mouth to protest, but he looks at Yuna's fierce expression and then back at the students who are so uncharacteristically quiet while she defends them. He understands how this looks, a mother hen defending chicks, while he tries to pluck one out of the litter and send it to the battlefield after it had recently been decapitated. Never mind that the chick he has chosen is anointed by either the gods or the devils, take your pick.
"Fine. I'll make the offer. I'll send you the mission brief."
"Good." Yuna waits until Yaga has disappeared from sight before turning to her students. "Sorry for the interruption."
"Sensei," Satoru rubs his throat tiredly, "I can go. I'm fine now."
Suguru's hand on his shoulder is warm and steady, an anchor to earth while the Honored One floats amidst the clouds, reminding Satoru of all that he could be.
"You're not fine, Gojou-kun."
"I didn't clear him." Shouko looks guilty. "I just said physically he was back to normal, I didn't say he should restart missions."
"I know." Yuna gives Shouko a little smile. "Don't worry. I will take care of this."
Suguru examines her worriedly. "Sensei, I don't…I don't think you're fine either."
"I'm okay, Getou-kun. Thank you. We will end our lessons early today." Yuna blinks slowly. Her eyes are red and her movements jittery. She looks like she has not slept or eaten in days.
"I can go," says Satoru again, and the Honored One nods heartily in agreement.
"I said no, Gojou-kun." She makes a movement to comfort him, but pulls away at the last second. Her palms grip her elbows, giving herself the hug she won't give to him. "Don't worry. Just rest. Haibara-kun, Nanami-kun, Getou-kun will help with martial arts training this week." Suguru nods furiously, his bangs bobbing with the movement. "Don't forget about your essays either."
Clearly, the last thing on her mind is grading essays, but Yuna has always been so dutiful for no reason at all.
You sure? The Honored One sneers. Didn't that man say to ask your teacher?
But Yuna has just defended him, just saved him from a mission that Satoru doesn't want to go on—but isn't she hiding something? Satoru doesn't want to ask.
"Sensei."
She looks straight at him, her eyes meeting his naked blue ones with an intensity she hadn't before Everything With Amanai had happened.
"Yes, what do you need, Gojou-kun?"
Satoru thinks of the sleepless nights she'd pulled to cover up the mess in Hamamatsu, the way she'd urged them to come back from Okinawa, the way she'd yielded to Satoru's whims. Suguru's hand finds his, and Satoru squeezes it tightly.
It doesn't matter what that Zen'in man had said. It was Satoru's fault Amanai had died. He'd messed up, and now, like always, Yuna is cleaning up the remnants.
"Just come back safe," says Satoru. "I'll be ready for the next mission."
She gives him the small smile she has always saved for Suguru and Shouko. "Take your time. I will take care of the rest."
The Special Grade mission is urgent and complicated. The presence of a Special Grade curse, thought to be the birth of a Cursed Womb in response to some divine trigger, was reported at the Hie Shrine. It is dangerous and somewhat odd for such a high-grade curse to appear in the middle of the city at such a highly trafficked site, but the failed merger and the death of someone like Fushiguro Toji must have ripple effects. The shrine has already been shut down, much to the dismay of confused tourists, but the School had received reports of multiple casualties at a small wedding ceremony that had been held the night prior. Both the bride and groom were killed, confirming to Yuna again that no marriage has ever ended well.
Yuna looks over the brief in the car even though she is already familiar with its contents, but she needs something to focus on other than Zen'in Naoya.
When she had proposed this solution to the Great Families, she did not think the Zen'in clan would send their precious heir. Surely there was another Special Grade One they could send on whose shoulders the clan's future did not reside, or maybe the Zen'ins were so confident in Fushiguro Megumi as the future head that they saw Naoya as disposable. Yuna would feel bad, if only Naoya had a single redeemable quality to him.
"Major dickwad," Toji smirks in the empty front seat, next to the auxiliary manager who is anxiously navigating through traffic and ignoring the palpable tension between his passengers. Yuna has been awake for so long, she no longer needs Nightmare's Whim to hallucinate. Toji has been following her for days, now, his entrails always dragging on the ground behind him.
Yuna ignores him. She tries to ignore Naoya, too, but the Zen'in heir is surprisingly chatty. She would have taken the subway, but Naoya had refused to breathe the same air as monkeys, and so they had taken the one of the School's luxury cars instead.
"Woman, how slow do you read?" Naoya drawls. "Do you even know how? You've been stuck on the same page since we got in the car."
Yuna closes the manila folder and folds her hands in her lap. "I was merely double-checking something, Zen'in-san."
"Zenin-sama," corrects Naoya. "You are speaking to the future head of the clan, woman. Watch how you address me."
Yuna is glad she is blind in her left eye, because when she turns toward Naoya as if she cares about his opinion, she can't really see him.
"Apologies," she says, "I reserve that address for the current head. Is your father in good health?"
"Watch it, bitch."
Yuna hums and looks unseeingly out her window. "I'm surprised they sent you on this mission, Zen'in-san."
"They sent Satoru-kun on this mission, but apparently you think he's too pussy to go," laughs Naoya. "You're a real loyal Gojou bitch, that's for sure, to be able to pull him out of a mission. I volunteered. I'll show him what real strength is."
"You're so very brave, Zen'in-san."
Naoya grabs a fistful of her hair and yanks her back so that his face lingers right above hers. Yuna winces but does not react otherwise. Toji leans toward them from his seat to get a better look.
"Sass," he chides. "You know you can't afford that."
"Let me be clear," Naoya sneers. His eyes are a lighter shade of green than Toji's, larger but more angular, and his lips are thinner and his teeth razor-sharp. "I came here to teach Satoru-kun and his bitch of a teacher a lesson." Naoya tugs so hard that Yuna swears her scalp is bleeding. "This will be the last time you order around the Three Great Families, you cunt. I'll deliver you back to Satoru-kun used, broken, and bleeding. Maybe then he'll think twice about letting an Object run wild."
The car pulls to a stop, and the auxiliary manager stammers, "We're here."
Naoya throws Yuna away from him. She barely catches herself before her head crashes into the window. Her vision spins, and she lets out a slow breath. Toji laughs at her and his breath tickles her ear.
"Get out," snarls Naoya.
Yuna opens the car door, squinting in the bright sunlight as she gets out. The day is unbearably nice. She craves a cigarette. She wants to throw up.
A string of red torii gates guards a flight of stairs to the shrine. The sky is bright and clear, but a shroud of dark miasma lingers at the top of the staircase. The curse's presence is the heaviest Yuna has sensed since she'd first activated her Miracle for Yuki in their second year.
To her surprise, another black sedan pulls up next to them, and Kento steps out of the car, dressed in uniform, his blade wrapped in his hand.
"Nanami-kun," she says, stunned. "What are you doing here?"
"I told the School to deliver him here," Naoya replies, stepping out of the car only after the auxiliary manager opens the door for him. "Call it a learning opportunity."
"He is a first-year!"
"A talented one, so I've heard." Naoya takes a step towards Kento; Yuna takes a mirroring step back, buffering them. "A Grade Two already, eh? He has promise. It'll be good training for him."
"No." Yuna points to the auxiliary manager who had driven them here. "Take Nanami-kun back to campus, this is out of his league."
"Sensei," mutters Kento.
Yuna blinks, and suddenly Naoya is right in front of her and his fist is burrowed in her stomach. The punch sends her flying back into the sedan, sending an electric shock all the way down her spine before she collapses to the ground, wheezing, as blood trickles out of her mouth and onto the pavement.
"Sensei!" Kento kneels at her side, but she pushes him behind her as Naoya's feet appear in her vision.
"I told you." A hand grips her hair again and yanks her up so that she is looking at Naoya's face. She hates how much he looks like Toji. "I'm here to teach you a lesson. He stays, or I'll kill him."
Kento blade appears at Naoya's neck. "Release her."
"Oh-ho. I thought you were smart. Do you have a death wish?"
"Maybe, if you don't let her go."
For a moment, Yuna thinks Naoya will rip her head clean off her body just like this, but he releases her slowly.
"Only because we have a mission," he grins. "There's a Special Grade lurking. Why go through the hassle of killing you when I could just get a curse to do it?"
Naoya turns, his navy haori billowing in the wind as he ascends the staircase. Kento kneels back at Yuna's side.
"Are you all right?"
It's such a worthless question that is asked far too frequently. Yuna wipes the blood off her chin and paints it over the characters on her arms.
"I'm fine." She thinks Naoya may have broken a rib; it hurts to take a deep breath. Her scalp burns with the stabs of a million needles. "I'm sorry you were roped into this, Nanami-kun."
"It was me or Yuu," he says. "I thought I'd have a better chance."
"Does Yaga-sensei know about this?"
"I don't know."
"Okay." Yuna drops her bag to the ground and takes out her scrolls. She presses a Miracle seal to Kento's chest and then collects several nails wrapped in seals. "You and I will drop a Curtain. It will keep anything with a Special Grade's level of Cursed Energy in. When Zen'in is distracted fighting the Special Grade, you need to leave."
"I'm not leaving you, sensei."
"I'm not letting you die here, Nanami-kun."
Her student frowns. "I'm not letting you die, either. It's okay. I'll be fine."
Yuna wants to scream. No one is fine. Nothing is fine.
Behind Kento, Toji, the devil of her hell, just throws his head back and laughs.
Tsukumo Yuki is in Tokyo of her own volition by pure coincidence. Her flight to Malaysia leaves from Haneda Airport in two days, and she had been debating whether or not to visit the School (she honestly wants to see Yuna, and also wants to see what the School did with Zen'in Toji's body), when Yaga had called her.
Yuki, like her kouhai Mei Mei, does not do things for free. Favors are for losers, and work, however easy, is still work, and Yuki hates doing work. So what if a civilian dies here and there, the general population needs culling anyway, and a non-sorcerer dying probably means one less curse for a sorcerer to exorcise. Yuki thinks there are benefits to not trying so hard.
Still, Yaga's request is hard to turn down. Reports of Tengen's failed merger are not exactly reassuring; who would've thought the Gojou prodigy could possibly fail? Yuki isn't judging him for it—she'd almost died when she was a student too—but it's never great for morale to hear that the god of the jujutsu world had failed to protect a holy vessel. The implications for Tengen's stability are unclear. Will the Barrier Techniques protecting not just the Schools but all of Japan collapse? What will that mean for curses released around the world? Is it possible (Yuki grimaces at the thought) there will be even more curses born, and even more work to do?
She wishes Zen'in Toji had agreed to her little research project. But no, he'd not only said no but had also blinded and tried to sell her best friend instead! And now her best friend is mad at her! Yuki feels sorry for herself. Why do people expect so much out of Special Grades anyway? They never get anything back. No one asks Yuki, "Yuki-sama, why are you so bored? Why is life so mundane for you? What do you want to do?" It's always, "Special Grade, do this! Special Grade, do that!"
How boring.
Yaga's request is also boring, but the people involved are less so. Well, namely, just Yuna. This new first-year seems reasonably strong, too. And this Zen'in Naoya guy…Yuki makes a face as she watches him skirt around the Special Grade curse, clearly not trying, instead making Yuna and her student battle the curse head on. The student already has a deep wound in his leg, protected from a full-on amputation only by the grace of Yuna's Barrier. The Special Grade, humanoid, white, with purple stripes and multiple eyes, howls as it collects a massive amount of Cursed Energy into a beam pointed directly at the first-year student.
Naoya is such a jackass. Yuna can't beat a Special Grade Curse, even with the help of her severe-looking student. Yuki stands up, finally deciding it's time to intervene.
That is, until Yuna unleashes a Domain Expansion, and Yuki, poised on the roof of the Hie Shrine like the heathen she is (or rather, the goddess returning to her point of worship), just stares.
Where the fuck had this come from? Yuna has a Domain? And she hadn't told Yuki?
The Domain hides the humanoid Special Grade Curse and Yuna from sight, while Zen'in Naoya and the first-year student prowl outside its boundary like the useless bums they are. It takes half a minute for the Domain to shatter. When it does, Yuna is on all fours, gasping for air, blood pouring through a wound in her side, but the Characters for Barrier and Blast are both glowing as the Special Grade Curse shrieks and dissolves away.
A single finger, shriveled and with a long, purple nail, falls to the ground in front of her.
Yuki almost whistles. It has been a long time since the School retrieved one of Ryoumen Sukuna's fingers. Something must have caused the dormant Cursed Object to resonate—Yuki is willing to bet it on Amanai Riko's death. Or maybe Zen'in Toji's.
"You've gotta be kidding me." Naoya walks to Yuna and picks up the finger. He cannot hide the awe in his voice. "A bitch like you mastered a Domain?"
"How else do you think I escaped from your cousin?" Yuna pants as she looks up, her eyes blazing. Yuna's miraculous escape from Zen'in Toji finally makes sense. "Your family brings out the worst in me."
"Careful, now," he drawls. "Don't forget who's teaching the lesson."
Naoya pulls out a knife from his robes and flings it fast as lightning right at the first-year student. Before Yuki can react, a golden Barrier erupts in front of the student just as the dagger is about to pierce his head. It shatters, the Miracle talisman burns at the student's chest, and Yuna lets out a bloody whimper as her already depleted Cursed Energy disappears completely.
"Amazing," admires Naoya.
"You fucking bastard." The first-year student rushes at Naoya, but his reaction time is slow and Naoya just side steps him and knocks him out with a singular punch across his face. He collapses several meters away from Yuna, unconscious.
"Come, now." Naoya leans down and grabs Yuna by her hair. She should've known better to wear white on a mission; her clothes are drenched with blood. Yuki still thinks she's pretty. "I told you I'd return you used and broken. But maybe I won't return you at all. You think Satoru-kun will gift you to me, as payment for doing his work?"
Yuna opens her mouth to retort, but Naoya shoves the Cursed Object down her throat and grips her jaw closed.
"You're essentially a Cursed Womb, right?" he says, eyes glinting. "What do you think happens when the souls of two Cursed Objects collide? You think Satoru-kun will still want you when you're just a mindless curse?" Naoya leans close. "I think I could tame you better instead."
Yuki appears right behind him, and her steel dragon blares her arrival with an earsplitting howl. "I think that's quite enough."
Just as Naoya turns around, Yuki punches him so hard across the face that he skids meters away. His head collides with the statue at the shrine's entrance, the one of a mother monkey cradling a baby. Before he gets to his feet, Yuki's dragon wraps around him and binds him in place.
"Who the fuck are you?" spits Naoya.
Yuki ignores him and kneels in front of Yuna. She pries Yuna's mouth open and fishes the Cursed Object out. It looks intact.
The sun is setting, and Yuna looks at her like she doesn't quite believe Yuki is there. It's the face Yuki likes on her the most—the one of wonder, the one of worship. It makes Yuki warm inside.
"Yuki-san?" Yuna croaks.
"Hush." Yuki wipes away the blood from Yuna's chin. "I'm here." She pulls Yuna in, wrapping her arms around her, holding her still. "I'll take you home."
It takes several seconds, but then Yuna holds Yuki back, and her face is buried in Yuki's shoulder and she sobs, truly sobs, in a way that Yuki has never seen her do so. Her entire frame shakes, her hands bury themselves in Yuki's hair, and soon they are kissing, never mind the taste of iron and remnant Cursed Object. It makes that warmth in Yuki grow, and meters away, her dragon purrs. Yuki strokes Yuna's hair and whispers reassurances in her ear, and Yuna just cries harder.
Ah, yes. This is the way Special Grades should be worshipped. Satoru-kun is so lucky that Yuki had given her up.