Chapter 17

He set them all up in different parts of the forest. He gave them all a few finger bearer curses to practice upon. "You can come and go as you please, this is a personal barrier for you, those things can't leave it, but you can. Now, if you will excuse me I am going to start with Junpei."

He noticed the look of uncertainty among the brothers, but Junpei assured them he would be fine.

They returned to the dorms were Junpei peered down with worry. Suiryu on the other hand couldn't wait to get started. "Okay, now the agreement. I will transfigure your hand and ONLY your hand at first. We will see how long it takes you to turn it back. If you take more than four hours, we will stop and I will turn it back. Understood?" he asked.

He nodded nervously.

He offered his hand, Suiryu touched it and transfigured it to the same as Mahito had done before.

He screamed aloud, but then settled when the transformation was done. His hand swelled and became clawed and scaly. "You have four hours," Suiryu stated.

He left Junpei alone to try and reverse the transfiguration.

However there was a small detail Suiryu left out, unless one is proficient in such a skill, reversing it, is all but impossible. But he wasn't about to tell him that, after all, he is still learning about his new curse form. Junpei has an untapped potential that he has yet to discover.

Suiryu can't wait to see what he can do.

But he also made mental note with the other brothers. There were aspects of themselves that came from Yuuji, he doesn't doubt that the least bit. "Yuuji used flesh shackles, muscle rope and bone needles against Sukuna… it's no coincidence that the three got that skill from him…" he muttered.

Speaking of Yuuji.

He ventured to one of the empty dorms. There, Yuuji laid there, unmoved still from the whole process. As he was knocked out, Suiryu continued his treatment in healing his arms. He will need to have his jujutsu back sooner than later if he is to assist him. But, much to Suiryu's surprise, the healing is already starting, the upper part of his arms were getting the flow back, the bottom part… slowly but surely. "This did take a lot out of you, didn't it? I won't have you do this again," Suiryu vowed. "I hope you understand my perspective dear brother…"

#

Four hours passed.

Suiryu did his rounds and found the brothers were getting stronger and better at their abilities, those who are limited began to push and see how far their talents would go. Tanso in particular. Instead of training, Tanso merely wondered the woods where they were living in. When Suiryu found him again, he had a lot of animals with him. They were blood red and had a slight demonic look to them. "Huh? How did you make these?" he asked. "I can already tell these are not your blood familiars."

Tanso then showed him the maggots from before. Oddly enough he also carried a corpse of an animal and placed it on the ground. It was a fox at one point, but in a great state of decay. Tanso placed a maggot on it, from there it began to feed off the corpse and then grew large enough to consume the body! It turned and became the fallen! A demonic fox forged from the remains and the maggot took its shape. "Ah, very good. So you can turn those who have fallen into battle into allies huh? Does this take a lot of energy?"

He shook his head no.

"Okay then, keep me posted on this, let me know if these familiars of your hold together well enough."

He merely smiled, and nodded.

But now, he had to see Junpei.

He remained outside, yet he was hiding himself away. Suiryu sighed aloud when he heard sniffling. "Junpei, the four hours is up!" he called in a disappointing tone. "Come out…"

Junpei came out of hiding.

He hid his hand from him, Suiryu reached out and offered to turn it back. Yet as he looked down, a moment of pause came over him.

The hand was normal.

"Wait…" he said in a shocked tone. "Junpei, you…"

He nodded.

The tears were not of defeat, but that of victory. He must have wept out of joy when he got his limb back to the way it was. "I suppose tomorrow, it's the full arm."

"Okay…" he whispered meekly.

"Still… how?" he asked curiously enough. There was no sense of transfiguration in his curse energy, he couldn't and shouldn't have been able to do this.

But Junpei said. "What you said earlier…" but paused. "When you said you could teach me to be stronger, so I can face that asshole who killed my mother and I… you meant every word of it right?"

Ah, that was it.

That was his motivation!

Suiryu grinned wickedly once more. "The sooner you conquer this… the sooner I show you many ways on how to kill the bastard."

His human eye suddenly turned black with the thought of it all. "Okay," he said with determination. "Tomorrow… your promise to transfigure the full arm?"

This took him aback, but the willingness to do a full limb… that was something he didn't expect to say the least. Suiryu merely nodded as the brothers returned. He looked back to Junpei and said. "Wanna show off?"

A smirk came over him. "BROTHERS! LOOK WHAT JUNPEI CAN DO!" Suiryu shouted as he transfigured the hand once more.

Junpei cringed as he saw the grotesque hand return. But then, there was a gritted look on his face. He glared at it before it started to turn back to normal. It was a slow process, but within twenty minutes, his hand was back.

The brothers were stunned.

"Little one…" whispered Sho. "YOU'RE STRONG!" he cheered. They celebrated him as if he were a conquering hero!

Suiryu rolled his eyes to it all.

#

Meanwhile…

"Wait, he's not coming back yet?"

"Nope, so he asked me to help out. So, how's everyone taking his lessons?" Gojo was checking on the students, when they learned Suiryu wouldn't be back for a while to say the least. He was rather stunned to see how disappointed they were. "I thought we were suppose to take on the mountain every day?" demanded Mika. "How can we when he isn't here?"

"We have to beat him to move on," muttered Nobara. "None of us have yet and we should have since he is suppose to only be at minimal strength!" she protested. "We're a lot stronger than he should be at minimal power!"

"Remember what he said, you never face the same opponent twice, or something like that," Gojo stated. "While you were running the mountain, he was watching you was he not?"

They froze.

"Damn it," muttered Fushiguro. "So this is an opportunity then. Improve our skills without him watching and influencing us. Not to mention, he was studying us too wasn't he? We can't waste this time,"

"That's the spirit!" Gojo stated with glee. "But he did tell me to relay this message. Work on your curse energy. Mika, I'll be working with you to get your senses sharpened, but everyone else…"

"We haven't found a way to increase my energy…" muttered Nobara.

"Oh, he said put all of it in your nails. Then when you replace that energy, take one nail and absorb the power back in through your hands." Gojo explained. "If you want to push yourself, do one every two hours."

She froze to the suggestion. "How the hell does he… oh right…" she muttered and sighed. "Fine!" she said in a sarcastic tone. "I might as well get started!"

"I'm going to keep building my strength up…" Fushiguro announced.

Panda and Toge too as they excused themselves, Gojo turned to Mika. "Well then, let's get started!"