Lazymanjones96: "Interesting stuff looking forward to more"
Thank you very much for your review! I hope I can continue to hold your attention for the upcoming chapters and the rest of the story.
joshuafoster36: "If you cant weote a fic without nerfing your plot point but also making your protagonist stupid then why write a fic like this?"
First off, thank you for the review, second, I can write a fic without nerfing the system but it'd just be someone blowing through the entire plot without a care in the world. I don't really understand what you said about making my protagonist stupid, because he isn't, he's 15 years old and doesn't have much experience with the outside world. "Then why write a fic like this?" Because I want to. If you want a simple, straight forward gamer style fic with an overpowered main character who gets a ton of girls and lemons every chapter, then you are not someone who would enjoy my writing style. Sorry if that came off as a bit rantish, but reviews without any real point or proper criticism rub me the wrong way. Clearly, this person didn't care enough to explain their problems with the fic properly and left a random review just to share their frustration.
Final thing, I'm sorry for the late update this week; kinda slept through the entirety of my Saturday before getting destroyed by Shadow of the Erdtree. As an apology, I'll have another chapter come out slightly earlier this week.
Without further ado, please enjoy!
Saki was scared. Her bus had crashed on the way down the mountain due to some gray, tumor-covered curse, and had subsequently snatched her away from the vehicle while everyone else was regrouping.
Thankfully, while it was making its hasty escape, it had loosened its grip enough for the girl to wriggle her way out of its grasp and run away. Based off of the slowly closing in groans though, it was not keen on giving up.
It seemed to be taking its time with the chase however, slowly stalking in between thick maple trees like a hunter on patrol. Each time it passed a plant, its hulking hands would leave indents in the trunk as a vague sort of marking. Those marks only served to scare the girl more, thoughts of how many ways such a creature could squeeze her to death if it was able to mold tree trunks like putty as it had been.
When a low growl came from a terrifyingly short distance away, Saki hunched in on herself for a moment until rocketing onto her feet and sprinting away. Loud cries that sounded like some demonic form of laughing trailed after her as she weaved in between trees; if lady luck could bless her this one time, she could escape far enough away for her to get cell reception so she could call a sorcerer in.
It was an app given to all windows that applied for it, and for knowledge of the program to be found, they'd have to be approached by a sorcerer first. Such an inefficient system was dangerous at best, and downright detrimental to the entire population at worst. The only reason such an archaic program was in place was due to the higher ups in jujutsu society deciding that curses should remain secret to the greater populace, something a majority of the sorcerer population disagreed with.
Another shriek brought Saki from her thoughts as her head whipped around to see the curse bounding towards her. In her mind, she expressed her thanks to the demonic creature for its loud warning, which allowed her to jump out of the way of the attack and remain unharmed.
Its 4 grotesque legs hit the ground with a loud thump, leaves and other trash flying into the air. Two beady black eyes on the side of its head locked onto their target, the body they were attached to waiting only a moment before escaping from the ground again with another jump.
Saki's screech echoed through the forest before abruptly stopping.
Four days and 3 failed missions later, a sorcerer apprentice appeared on site. He'd been at the local jujutsu high school for lessons, and had received word of a girl going missing nearby. After consulting his teacher for information, he set out alone, unaware of the careful supervision he was under.
Having long since shed his cream colored school uniform for the day, Megumi Fushigoro entered the forest wearing a dark green jumper with black stripes. Of course, he wore baggy tracksuit pants to go along with his outfit, having always preferred comfortable clothes over practical ones, which meant his trainers were the only 'suitable' article of clothing he had on.
As soon as said shoes crossed the boundary between track and terrain, Fushigoro flicked his hands up into the hand sign for his divine dogs. Kuro appeared on his right, nose raised high in order to sense any trails that may have been left behind, while Shiro stood on his left, keeping an eye out for any visual phenomena that may indicate a starting point for the investigation. Megumi himself stood back, letting his shikigami do the work while he watched.
In less than a minute, Kuro let out a loud bark before running off in a random direction. Megumi followed closely behind, Shiro staying next to its master as an extra level of defense.
The black dog first stopped at a hand shaped mark on a tree, sniffing it carefully before breaking into another sprint. Megumi found his breaths beginning to deepen as they approached a large cave. Without hesitation, the black haired boy followed his shikigami inside.
With no visible light to guide him, Megumi relied on his sense of touch to move around; alas, he was unable to ignore the far reaching stench of corroded iron as his feet sank slightly into the floor.
Upon hearing the growl of one of his dogs, Megumi whipped out his phone and turned on the flashlight, his remaining free hand flying up to his mouth to prevent vomit from escaping. On the opposite end of the wall lay Saki, strung up by softened mounds of stone acting as cuffs. Her clothes were torn to shreds, the skin blow stained a crimson red from long since dried blood.
A call to the girl was received with heaving breaths and coughs, and a cry to stay away. Megumi told her that he was there to help, and that she'd be safe with him, only to receive a violent shake of the head in response. Her eyes turned downward, an action Megumi mirrored before suddenly stopping.
It was almost as if they'd been molded into meatballs; sorcerer uniforms shoved into flesh like balls made of human skin and bone laid strewn across the damp cave floors. Of course, condensation wasn't the only force to blame for the wetness common on every surface of the cave, blood from the molded sorcerers was splattered across every stone within the range of Fushigoro's eyes.
While he was distracted, his dogs moved into attack mode. Shiro moved behind its master, while Kuro ventured closer to where Saki was strung up. This proved to be a dangerous endeavor however, as the ground around Kuro twisted into a whirlpool of softened stone that left the shikigami trapped in the floor; at the same time, the cursed spirit leapt from the ground in front of Shiro with a wide open mouth.
Shiro leapt out of the way at the same time Fushigoro turned around. His hands flicked into their usual shadow puppet form once again as both divine dogs were resummoned to his side. Both sides surveyed one another for a moment before they both exploded into action.
The spirit snatched some stone from the ground, molding into putty with one hand before that entire arm was torn off by Shiro. Kuro followed closely behind, tearing off the remaining one of the curse's arms. Both shikigami provided the opening their master needed to finish the fight with a punch.
As the spirit began to turn to ash, so did the cuffs that were holding Saki up. Kuro was quick to catch the girl before she fell, supporting her long enough for the entire group to leave the cave.
Surprisingly, they were met by the strongest sorcerer at the mouth of the cave. The bandaged man seemingly had no problems surveying the two despite the white rags over his eyes, and quickly snatched the two of them up before clapping his hands.
"So that's the story behind me and the owner here." Fushigoro stared into his cup with a blank face, causing a small amount of worry to form within his classmate.
Adam, who had long finished his drink, glanced at the barista from across the store; she was cleaning up after a few customers, and would be busy for a while longer. "You seem guilty."
Fushigoro sighed quietly, "I kind of am. If I'd been there earlier, she wouldn't have been hurt as bad and those sorcerers wouldn't have lost their lives."
"I'm sure Blindfold must've called you stupid for feeling like that." Fushigoro's shoulders slightly rose at the mention of the event. "And I'm inclined to agree with him. You can't be everywhere at once, and you have your own life to live. At that time, you weren't even a sorcerer, so you shouldn't have been there. Maybe you should focus on that fact; that you saved her at all."
"Yeah, I guess so…" The black haired boy replied, stealing a glance at the still cleaning barista. "But then that makes me think about who I'm missing out on saving right now." Adam chuckled quietly at that comment, earning an annoyed look from his classmate, "is there something wrong with that?"
Adam waved his hand around lazily with a smirk. "Of course not, I just didn't think you could be so compassionate Fushigoro." He once again laughed at Fushigoro's deep scowl, "I agree with you though, it would be nice to be able to save everyone."
"But you don't think it's possible." Fushigoro finished, his frown lessening as the true meaning behind the boy's words came to light.
"It just isn't. There will always be people out of our reach, and I hate it; that doesn't mean I won't try to save them though. At some point over the last month, I began to change; when I first arrived here, I hated sorcery for what it did to me, what it took from me." Adam nestled the coffee mug he'd received between his hands, absorbing the residual warmth through his palms. "But then I began to recognize the good it could do, and the people it helped. I know it's ironic coming from me, but I think we're doing our best here, and we need breaks to be able to keep doing our best."
Fushigoro eyed his classmate for several moments, the boy's melancholic look resonating with something deep inside of his own mind; despite that, a joking smirk crept up onto his face. "Wow, I didn't think you were able to conjure a thought like that." Adam's indignant squawk only served to turn his smirk into a full blown smile. "Thank you though, that makes me feel a lot better."
Adam's face shifted from anger into surprise as he noticed the expression on his classmate's face. "Nice smile, Fushigoro." He taunted, causing his black haired classmate's face to instantly return to its usual annoyed form. The sudden change of expression caused Adam to burst out laughing, earning an annoyed grunt from his classmate.
"So what did you mean when you said it was ironic?" Using the boy's own words against him, Fushigoro watched Adam freeze momentarily before sighing.
"Turn on visual mode." Confused at the sudden sentence, Fushigoro's eyes widened; only for them to almost pop out of his head as a blue panel appeared in front of his classmate's face. "This is what I meant, Fushigoro, when I said I was different from everybody else in my family. Their cursed technique is called flame manipulation, the ability to conjure and manipulate various forms of fire. Mine is an anomaly, a cursed technique not connected to my lineage or another person, something unique only to myself. Blindfold explained it like this, my life is basically a video game. Things I do raise my stats, and I can gain levels and get skills by fighting or learning new things."
"You…why?" Fushigoro was speechless, his fingers flicking up and down the stat page while his jaw stayed agape.
"Why what?" Adam asked, watching Fushigoro's attention switch from skill to skill.
The boy regained his composure before pointing to the stat point label. "You have 95, why don't you use them?" Adam's face twisted into a tight frown in response to the question, but Fushigoro pushed on ahead anyway. "Why are you holding yourself back?"
Adam's grip tightened to the point where it was unknown whether his composure or the mug would break first. "I…I know it's dumb." His knuckles practically glowed a ghostly white due to the strength of his grip, but he placed down the mug before it could shatter. "I hate it, I hate it so much that I don't want to use it. I want to prove that even if I don't have their flames…" For some reason, he couldn't finish that sentence.
"But you don't care anymore." Fushigoro noted, remembering the talk they'd had just a day prior regarding his mother. "So why?" Adam's emotions began to swirl within him, amplifying with every sentence spoken.
The white haired boy sighed lowly, but it came out as more of a growl. "We should get going, we can pick this up after the movie." He truly intended to pick it back up when he was calmer, and in a place where he could blow off the steam he was building up. Usually curses would be perfect for that, but he was on resting duty for the next two days; an argument like this couldn't have come at a worse time.
Fushigoro however, didn't pick up on the signs. "Don't run from this, Adam. You told me yourself, rest is necessary to do your best; even if I don't like it, I'm taking your advice on board, so at least let me reciprocate the same thing."
"You don't want to do this, Fushigoro. I'm warning you." Adam reached into his coat and placed a small wad of bills on the table, something he'd prepared in case something like this happened. Despite his growing anger, he politely pushed his seat back in before leaving the cafe; only to be immediately followed by Fushigoro.
Once the door to the cafe closed, and the black haired boy had surveyed there was no one around, the floodgates opened. "Don't run from it Adam! You need to get beyond this, you need to–" He couldn't finish his sentence before said boy was in front of him with a raised fist.
Adam's knuckles slammed into Fushigoro's face, sending him rolling down the street like a rocket. While the black haired boy rolled onto his feet, Adam shook the dull pain that had formed from the impact off of his hand. "Ahhh, this is the sort of shit you learn in school; how to properly blow off steam. Too bad I didn't get to attend, knowledge like that is pretty useful, right?" The boy's amber eyes narrowed in his classmate's direction.
"You're only punishing yourself! I know it's complicated, so explain it to me, Adam; explain to me why you can't move past this!" Fushigoro ignored the throbbing sensation racking his body, putting his hands up in surrender while he talked.
"I'm telling you to drop it for now! We can pick this up later, okay?" Adam turned away, beginning to head towards the direction of the school before he was stopped by another yell.
"No! Because then you'll just run away again like you are now! We need to get through this, here and now." Fushigoro's voice became louder in Adam's ears as the black haired boy got closer. Finally, a hand met Adam's shoulder with a light tap, "please, just speak to me."
"I…what am I even supposed to say? I know how stupid it is, and I know I shouldn't hold myself back like this, but I can't help it. How am I supposed to stomach making use of something I don't even want to look at?" It was like a cold hand had clutched around his heart, freezing him in place.
"We can work this out, even if we don't know how." Fushigoro assured, moving up beside his classmate. He opened his mouth to speak once again, only to be interrupted by a notification from his phone; a notification that also came through Adam's phone at the same time. "Adam, did you get–" Fushigoro froze at the sight of Adam's face.
A grin so evil it looked like it belonged more on an ancient painting depicting deities rather than a 15 year old boy's face. Adam's hand clenched around his newly retrieved device, "perfect timing." He sneered before turning around and heading towards the direction of the area where the curse was supposed to be dwelling. "Come on, Fushigoro, we can talk when we get there."
Fushigoro sighed to himself quietly, doing his best to compose himself and restore his usual stoic expression. "Wait up, we'll catch the train to get there."
Their destination ended up being an abandoned warehouse on the edge of Tokyo harbor. With the glass of its windows splintered or outright destroyed, and its sheet metal walls being more of an orange color than the usual teal, it was clear as day to anyone walking past that the building hadn't seen much action since the previous century.
Adam raised a cursed energy enhanced fist and smashed it over the rusted lock keeping the doors together, shattering it in a single blow. The remaining shards of oxidized metal clattered against the ground in a broken symphony, a symphony which was quickly overwritten by the sound of the doors screeching against the ground.
Fushigoro followed close behind while Adam strolled through the building, his feet hitting every single barrel on the way in an odd form of staving off annoyance. In his mind, he silently prayed the upcoming fight would give them the opportunity to talk calmly afterwards.
It wasn't long before they came across a wide open space in the middle of the building. Dusty, black stained concrete stretched across the ground of their chosen battle arena, surrounded scarcely by rusted old appliances and structures. Fushigoro watched closely as Adam's cursed energy flared to life, taking on a more vibrant color due to his inner turmoil.
"Bwoo?" Adam's anger filled scowl flicked towards a barrel in the corner of his vision. In an instant, 3 cursed threads wrapped around said object and tore it away, revealing a small mound of fabric surrounding some sort of quivering object.
With a short sigh, Adam crossed the distance between himself and the object, lifting some of the fabric off of his target while keeping his guard up. Once the rags were lifted, a small red curse with tentacles covering its mouth was revealed to the world.
Its eyes were wide with fear and anxiety, something that Adam ignored while turning away. "Is this some kind of joke? What the hell did Blindfold send us here for?"
"Adam!" Fushigoro's hand immediately stretched out, trying to reach his classmate. Before Adam could realize what was happening, he was blasted across the arena by a jet of water.
Megumi's hands clasped together in a dog shadow puppet, Kuro and Shiro leaping to his side from his shadow; as soon as they appeared, Nue shot out from the ground and into the air.
While Fushigoro's shadows were being summoned, Adam continued to roll until he crashed into a pile of rusty barrels. Due to their age and the strength of the impact, Adam's body sent large shards of metal flying in every direction around him. Orange tinted shards sliced and slipped past his body as the dust settled. With a growl of pain, he ignored the impacts and leapt onto his feet like an athlete who'd just snorted smelling salts.
Blood began to pour from the numerous cuts on his body, each of which was made by a rusty shard of metal, but the white haired boy was not perturbed as he took a deep breath. 'If there ever is a time to try this.' The thick haze of cursed energy that had coated his body coalesced into hundreds of tiny threads wrapping across his skin.
He hadn't had an opportunity to try out what his new levels in cursed tendril gave him, but the test he was conducting at that moment was as good as any. With his limited knowledge of sutures, Adam had no small amount of difficulty stitching up his wounds via cursed thread. That limited knowledge didn't hold him back however when it came to manipulating cursed energy, something he'd become rather adept in.
With freshly stitched wounds, each of which glowing a light blue to signify the use of energy, Adam began to stalk forward. "That really hurt, asshole." He growled, clenching his fists together as his aura sparked anew. 'I'll definitely need to get a tetanus shot after this, but for now I need to focus on keeping my skin together.' The white haired boy sent a glance at his classmate, who he told to stay out of the fight when they'd been called in; pride wasn't going to get in the way of things now, however. "Fushigoro, back me up while I get in close."
"Right." Fushigoro slipped into line behind his classmate, putting up two fists before they suddenly broke into a sprint towards the red colored spirit.
"Bwoh?!" Its startled cry was ignored as Adam reeled a foot back and slammed it into the creature's tentacle covered mouth. The rags that had once covered it flew away, revealing a white underbelly covered by marble colored flesh over the top.
Fushigoro didn't give it a chance to recover, mentally commanding Nue to blast it to dust with its electricity. Violet colored lightning bolts ricocheted off of the spirit's body as it barrelled through the air; startled cries trailing behind its body like a joke character out of an old cartoon. "Adam!"
"Right!" Adam charged forward, preparing to catch it with another attack before it hit the ground. Before he could reach it however, the threads keeping his right calf together dissolved, causing him to fall over. The attempt wasn't for naught however, as the spirit still ended up landing on a pile of rusted metal.
Fushigoro quickly rushed to his classmate's side, helping him to his feet while wrapping one of the white haired boy's arms around his shoulder. "Are you alright?"
Adam snorted, feeling some of his anger leaving him in order to make way for the adrenaline boost he was receiving. "Peachy." He joked, gripping Fushigoro's shoulder tightly while he replaced the threads holding his cuts together. "I need to stay focused on my wounds, so I'm not able to fight at max capacity."
"That's fine, I'll cover you. Maybe you can use some stat points to recover?" Fushigoro gained a smirk at Adam's newly formed scowl. "I'm kidding, just stay put while I exorcize this thing."
"Stay on guard, this thing has a funky aura." Adam warned, watching Nue swoop around the rusted pile of junk the cursed spirit had fallen into. At Fushigoro's silent command, a loud screech escaped its throat, followed by a thick stream of purple lightning.
"I get what you mean; it's almost like it's holding back." Fushigoro's smirk slid off of his face as the rubble pile exploded, flinging dust and rubble into the air like a tornado of destruction. Shiro and Kuro intercepted any large pieces, keeping their master and his classmate relatively unharmed while the dust began to dissipate.
A devilish chuckle echoed through the building as the final piece of rubble hit the ground. With 9 green arms, 4 on each side of its torso and one replacing its head, it was clear the new cursed spirit in front of them was not the origin for the clearly human sounding laugh. The real source was quickly revealed though, as a man with black hair and a long ponytail waltzed out from behind the curse with a smile.
His traditional buddhist garbs wrapped around his body loosely, betraying any intentions the man may have had in regard to showing off his figure. This was clearly no normal man however, since lobotomies have long since outlawed around the world, leaving nobody alive with scars like the stitchmark shaped ones that covered the man's forehead. "Daaaaaagoooon." His silky voice drawled out the name mockingly, "I know you had a fight with Jogo, but you can't be running away like this all the time." The man gently chided, reaching down and picking up the red cursed spirit in his arms. "Your cursed energy has even gone and gotten the attention of some newbie jujutsu sorcerers." His gaze flicked up to said amateurs, a distinctly smug look on his face. "I'm glad they weren't able to hurt you, but we still should get some payback for those attacks they tried to hit you with."
Both Fushigoro and Adam felt a chill crawl up their spines. The man's once smug look transformed into a teasing grin, one that promised immeasurable amounts of pain towards any it was turned on. "Adam, call Gojo. Something is very wrong here."
"Oh, we can't have that! It would ruin the surprise!" With a snap of his fingers, a thick veil spread across the entire warehouse, locking everybody within. Neither of the two boys knew what the 'surprise' was, but they were extremely keen to have their teacher ruin the secret if it meant escaping with their lives.
Fushigoro's sweat glands began to work overtime as he sensed the virtual ocean of cursed energy the man in front of him possessed. Adam seemed to sense the same, as his joints locked up and the threads stitching his body together dissipated into air.
With his classmate down for the count, and a special grade curse user in front of him, Fushigoro Megumi clenched his hands into fists and raised them, one tucked tightly into his torso while the other was outstretched.
"With this treasure, I summon…"
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