I watch in horror as Satoru's lifeless body lays in my arms. I look around and everyone I know is dead. Blood paints the ground, the city turned to rubble, and Satoru's eyes have grown white instead of the bright happy blue they used to be.
"Satoru." I say with tears streaming down my face.
"Pity. What a waste of talent. So much devastation could happen with one Hollow Purple. Instead he chose to be lame and fight for the 'greater good'. Stupid." I hear Sukuna say.
"Fuck you." I say with rage.
He chuckles and kneels down to my level.
"Funny choice of last words."
I hear my son crying. Wailing somewhere near by. Please no. Please not him too.
Please...
———
I wake sweating and screaming. Satoru holds me and my body shakes in fear. It felt so real. But Satoru is right here. It couldn't be real. It can't be.
"It's okay, I'm her love." Satoru says quietly rubbing my shoulder.
"You're here..." I say looking at him through tears bringing my hand cautiously to his face.
"I always will be too. I'll never leave you." He assures me.
We sit and he gets me to take deep breaths, pulling me out of panic.
"Prison realm again?" He asks.
I shake my head, "Sukuna." I say as if i'd seen a ghost.
He sighs and nods, "I told you, I'm coming back to you. You have nothing to worry about."
"And how do you know that for sure?" I say sitting up and looking at him through the dark with wide eyes.
He sighs and smirks, looking down at our hands holding each other. His eyes glow in the dark, even without his infinity. He looks like an angel.
"I just do. I'm the strongest. In many ways more than just physically." He says pulling me into his chest. I listen to his steady heartbeat, and it calms me, "I promise you, I will win this."
I take another deep breath and let it out shakily.
"I promise." He says.
I hear Niko crying and get up and quickly walk to his room. I pick him up and hold him tightly to my chest. I kiss his forehead and gently bounce him in my arms trying to calm him down. Satoru comes in behind me and wraps us both into his strong, steady arms.
"See, we're all here. Safe. Always will be. I'll never let anything happen to either of you my love." He says firmly.
I nod as Niko calms down, yawning in our arms.
"I love you both so so much." I say.
"We love you too." Satoru answers.
———
"Yuji, I promise you won't hurt me. Just hit me." I tell him.
He sighs, "okay."
He throws his fist at me and hits my new shield, pushing me back a few feet.
"Nice! Great work Yuji. Your skill are pretty advanced. But I think we really need to work on something else Satoru and I have been thinking about." I tell him.
"Yeah? What's that?" He asks curiously.
"Ta-Da!" I hear Satoru say behind me pulling a sheet off the items on a table. Shoko is standing beside him and I join them.
"Whoa, what are those? They look... Gross." Yuji says walking up to the table.
"They're the rest of our brothers." Choso says walking up with his hands in his pockets.
Choso has grown on me since I met him. I hated him at first obviously, but his dedication to Yuji has changed a lot of his opinions on things. He isn't a bad guy at heart I don't think, just misdirected at first. I've had the opportunity to train with him for the past few weeks now and he's very skilled and intelligent. He see's the truth, and wants to help us. He mainly only cares about Yuji, and what Yuji cares about is what he cares about. Which works out well for us.
"What? Will they be joining the fight too?" Yuji asks.
"Well..." I say not sure how to explain it.
"Nope! You're gonna consume them!" Satoru says smirking.
"Wait what?" Yuji says looking to Choso, "am I really?"
Choso sighs and nods, "it's the only way we'll find peace, and the only way to get revenge for the death of our sister."
"Still so weird to think about Yuki being related to them." I say next to Satoru.
"Right?" He says agreeing.
"So you're... okay with this?" Yuji asks Choso.
He nods, "our belief is that you'll be able to focus on learning not only the reverse curse technique to heal yourself, but possibly even learn blood manipulation as well." He says.
"Man, how messed up is that?" Yuji says to himself, "alright, i'll do it."
"Good! Now, when you consume the death paintings, we'll work with you on concentrating on the new techniques. Choso will help you with most of it, but Shoko can explain RCT better than anyone." Satoru says.
"Yeah, it'd be a good idea to have a few more people trained with reverse curse technique out there." I say.
"Yeah, the blood manipulations should come easier to you. The more advanced technique is the reverse curse technique for healing. Most people can't heal others. It could be because they aren't skilled enough or because the one being healed rejects it. But generally there are only a few ways to do it. Choso should be able to heal using blood he can generate with his cursed energy, which is more than likely how you'll use yours. Others can just do it naturally." Shoko says.
"Yeah, I can show you how once you get blood manipulation down." Choso says supportively.
"And i'll be there to walk you through reverse curse technique." Shoko says.
"But we only have a limited amount of time so only the most important stuff yeah?" I say to them.
They nod and I take a breath.
"Think you can handle all that Yuji?" Satoru asks.
"Yeah." Yuji says smirking with a determined look.
"Good! Good luck guy! Let me know how he does at the end of the day Shoko." Satoru says wrapping his arm around my shoulder taking Niko from her.
"Will do." She says.
"Great, now if you don't mind, Naomi and I have some training to do ourselves." Satoru says leading us away.
"Yeah yeah, 'training'." Shoko says teasingly.
"Oh shut up, we do." I tell her punching her in the shoulder.
"Good luck Sensei's! And I won't let you down!" Yuji says.
"I know you won't." I tell him and we head off.
We head back to the courtyard of our apartment and Satoru teleports inside to grab the play pen for Niko. He isn't really moving around yet, but he needs a place to rest. He is very smart for his age already though. Mostly because I think whenever we train like this he feels me in distress and tries to protect me. It's weird but he's very perceptive. He doesn't have the six eyes but he takes after his father. Maybe it's a Gojo trait.
He can flip over on his belly and hold his head up. He likes to keep an eye on us to make sure nothing happens. There have been a few times when he's gotten stressed and puts up his paralytic infinity. He's only an infant so he doesn't understand this is all on purpose, but it's gotten both of us a few times already. He can't hold it for very long and it tires him out. With the six eyes it'd be no problem, but he only has infinity.
We are both surprised he is able to do this now though. Usually he'd have to be at least five to show signs of inheritance, but maybe it had something to do with Shibuya, and his genetics. Maybe it has something to do with Sukuna. We all already know since Satoru was born it affected the Jujutsu society, but maybe since Sukuna came back, this is the new norm? Who could say. Either way, he'll only get stronger from here.
Satoru comes back in an instant and sets up the play pen. He places a little half doughnut pillow in there to lay him on so he can kind of sit up, though I don't think he'll stay in that for long once we start.
"Ready?" Satoru asks once Niko settles in with a kiss to the forehead.
"Ready." I say.
We both stand across from each other and ready ourselves.
"Alright, try to dodge me." Satoru says.
"You know I can't." I say.
"Ah c'mon, you've gotten stronger and faster as you've trained with me. Just give it a shot. I want to see exactly how fast you've gotten." He says.
He lunges at me without giving me a warning and on instinct I jump out of the way. He never lays a finger on me.
He smiles that wild smile he gets in his high of battle, "see? Look at that. As fast as me."
"Doesn't mean I'm as strong." I say.
"You're pretty stealthy." He says.
"Sure but I don't have a domain expansion or any more aggressive type techniques." I say.
"But you're close. Not in the same way, but you can be very powerful in many different ways. For example, try suppressing your cursed energy." He says.
"What?" I say confused.
He chuckles and smirks putting his hands on his hips. His triceps popping out and his forearms flexing almost distracting me.
"Naomi, eyes up here. I'll give you what you want at the end." He says smirking and winking at me.
I chuckle, "okay okay, sorry. What do you mean by suppressing my cursed energy?" I ask.
"Well, using your paralytic power, you're able to take away one's cursed energy right?" He says.
"Well, yeah. Brain dead can be as powerful as I want it. So in theory I could only suppress the cursed energy output." I say.
"That's really good in general. But I want to try something different. Try suppressing your own cursed energy, sneaking up to me then as soon as you touch the limitless barrier, transfer brain dead on my cursed energy." He says.
"But Satoru, wouldn't that take away your limitless?" I ask.
"Only long enough for you to get close to me. I'm not going to actively fight it. I'm going to keep the barrier passive, so this should work only long enough to see what happens." He says.
"Okay." I say leery of this.
"Trust me. I know what I'm doing." He says.
We ready ourselves and when he nods, I use brain dead on myself. I feel the cursed energy drain from me and I hold it there. When I run away I feel lighter. More agile. Stronger even somehow, and I'm considered one of the most physically strong sorcerers, on par with Nanami. I run quickly to a hidden area behind Satoru and slowly sneak up close to him. He has no idea where I am. I can tell. His ears twitch in the direction he can see people that are behind him normally.
I lunge for him and right as my hand would be stopped by his limitless barrier, my brain dead technique is transferred through my chest, into my arm and to his barrier, rendering it completely useless. Only I can pass through, the barrier is still up, but it still creates a hole in his technique. The only weakness he has truly is me.
He smiles as he catches me in his arms, pulling me up and placing his strong hands on my waist.
"Perfect. Exactly as I thought. I never even saw you. You pushed right through the barrier without a problem. You're my only weakness." He says smiling.
"Isn't that a bad thing?" I ask.
He shakes his head smirking, "no. No Naomi this is perfect. It means you could potentially take down the strongest sorcerer alive. Meaning you could be a weakness to literally any sorcerer too." He explains.
"Creating a hole long enough to land a big blow." I say.
He nods, "exactly. You're a huge asset Naomi. I told you that you were strong."
I kiss him lovingly and he pulls me in close. My hands rest on his firm chest and his hands squeeze my hips gently. We pull away and he smiles widely.
"You never cease to amaze me." He says and I chuckle.
"I know you just explained it, but I don't know how exposing you like that is so amazing." I say.
He smirks and scoffs, "don't you see? You can literally take away so much power from someone. Sukuna being the main one in mind. If you ask me, that's more powerful than my techniques. And It means I'm not just this untouchable god that no one can come close to in power. It means I won't be alone on that front anymore. I'm just Satoru Gojo." He says smiling.
For the first time ever, he shows me his true feelings. The deepest ones that were never meant to show the light of day. All this time, he's felt alone and I never saw it. He's the strongest sorcerer ever known, and everyone knows it. But how lonely it must feel to be at the top with no one to understand you. Even I never saw it in his eyes. I treated him as if he was untouchable too.
I sigh and pull his head into my neck.
"I'm sorry. I never knew you felt alone like that." I say.
He chuckles and hugs me tightly. We stay like this for a minute until he finally pulls away.
"So, now that we know this great news, we can keep that on the back burner for Sukuna. Maybe, if I can take him down and you suppress his technique holding Megumi at bay, we can use your reverse curse technique to swap back with Itadori and get Megumi back." He says smiling.
I smile wide, hope filling my chest, "you've got a point. We can do this can't we?" I say.
He smiles, "of course we can. I told you to trust me. Now, if only you could do that to Niko when he paralyzes my arm when I try to change him."
I laugh and shake my head, "I think I can do that."
This could work. If Satoru can beat Sukuna down enough for me to slip in at the end and suppress him, then take control of him, we could swap him with Itadori and get Megumi back. Then we could take Sukuna out somehow later on. We could really do this. We could win.