Notes: You can't kill your past. But it sure would be convenient if you could. Especially when it returns to execute you.

Sorry about the mood whiplash from the end of the last chapter to the beginning of this one, but that's just the way the chapters fell. I guess it also serves to further juxtapose the past versus the present. We'll be back to the angst next chapter.

Chapter 15

Present Day

"Attention everybody!" Gojo announced, clapping his hands to get the attention of all the young mages who were together in one of the larger rooms in the castle, discussing the interrupted mess that was their competition. All of them were finally healed up - even Fushiguro, who had taken the longest due to the issue with the tree root removal.

Silence fell as they all turned to look at the mage-king. Yuta wondered what he was going to say. Was there further information about who had been behind the attack? Yuta had been busy healing some of the injured mages while the discussions had gone on immediately following the attack, but Yaga had briefed him on the main points discussed by the older mages.

"It appears that an organized group was behind the attack. We captured one of them, but he didn't have any useful information. It's likely he was being kept in the dark about the true reasons behind the attack. Unfortunately, due to the interruption, we were unable to determine a winner of the competition," Gojo continued.

Muttering broke out amongst his audience, some concerned about a possible follow-up attack, some debating who should be declared the winner. Gojo hadn't mentioned the grim details, but everyone knew that a number of mages had been killed while the focus had been on the barrier barring the king from the forest. It was seeming more and more likely that the barrier itself as well as the attackers within it had been a distraction to divert eyes away from the castle than an actual attempt to kill those who'd been trapped inside it.

"My brother and I would have defeated that S-rank if you hadn't done so yourself," Todo told the king. "Clearly we are the winners!"

"You're both on opposite teams, Todo. Does that mean the teams tied?" Kamo asked

"Yuta defeated the other S-rank alone," Maki cut in. "So the castle mages win."

"Okkotsu wasn't even participating," Mai insisted. "So anything he does doesn't count."

"You might as well say His Majesty won with that logic," Nishimiya told Maki, backing up Mai. The three women glared at each other. Yuta was not about to get involved in that mess.

Gojo had no such hesitation at butting into their glare-off. "I like your line of thinking, Nishimiya!" he said in an overly excited voice. Yuta knew no good could come with that tone. "As the viewers were unable to determine who won, I will choose the event for the end of the week, how does that sound?"

"Great, sensei!" Itadori piped up. Kugisaki similarly agreed. Yuta shook his head. The two of them got on very well with the king despite not knowing him nearly as long as the rest of the group. Itadori especially enjoyed joking around with him. Neither of them knew the signs of one of his bad ideas yet.

The man seemed overjoyed that someone agreed with him and promised the group an excellent time in three days. "Continue your lessons until then. I'm glad to see you've all been getting along better."

Yuta glanced around. While the women (minus Miwa) clearly still had their differences, Kamo had been more open than he usually was the past few days. Then there was the fact that Todo had practically glued himself to Itadori's side since day one. Even with the younger mage's extremely friendly disposition, he was starting to feel slightly suffocated from all the attention. Most importantly in Yuta's mind, the Hakari incident of last year seemed to have been forgotten (for now) if not entirely forgiven, pushed to the back of everyones' minds due to the chaos of this year's event.

Missions were starting to pile up, so assignments were handed out to be started on the day immediately following the final event. The mages had competed in a series of tournaments over the afternoon. First was jujutsu - which ended in a spar between Itadori and Todo that was nearly too fast-moving for the eye to follow. At the last second, Todo pretended he was about to use his magic to trip up the younger mage and claim the win.

Innate abilities were not allowed to be used, but he hadn't used his, only pretended to. Itadori had either forgotten the rules or assumed Todo would break them, allowing the older mage to take the win. It seemed like a bit of a dirty trick to Yuta, but Itadori took it in stride, grinning at his 'brother' and congratulating him.

Next up came kendo - with wooden swords instead of real weapons for safety. Miwa had been doing well until she was pitted up against Yuta, who commonly used a katana and had much higher mana reserves than her. He almost felt bad about winning. Of course, he lost to Maki in the finals. She was second to none when it came to weapons and one of the few who could trip him up in combat, even if she couldn't overpower him outright.

To no one's surprise, except for Itadori and Kugisaki (who didn't know the group as well), the go tournament saw Todo win yet another event. Though the man appeared to be a classic brawler, he had surprising smarts and an instinct for strategy that few others did. Yuta wasn't ashamed to lose to him, even if it was only the first round. It probably helped the other man's ego which had been so bruised last year as well. He hadn't thrown the match by any means - go just wasn't a game he got the chance to play much. He was certain Todo played with Kamo semi-regularly.

As Yuta made his way to the dining hall, he thought to himself that what Gojo had come up with for the afternoon hadn't been so bad after all. And apparently he had one final surprise for them at dinner. He wondered what was with that weird expression on his face earlier and put the thought to the side when he saw the elaborate setup for the evening. There were low tables and cushions all around the room but no extra space, so there would be no ballroom dancing like last year. Most of the castle would be here for once. Usually, the groups dined in smaller rooms separate from each other and even at different times as well. It was only for big occasions that everyone came together in one location.

The dinner was an elaborate one - more like a feast. The students sat interspersed with each other instead of strictly by their allies. Todo and Kamo told tales of their A-rank missions. Yuta translated a few of Toge's missions for the group, as he was also A-rank. He refrained from sharing stories of his own S-rank missions, more comfortable letting the others do the talking. Muta had apparently stashed another puppet nearby on standby and that form sat listening next to Miwa, though he obviously couldn't eat any of the food. Itadori and Nobara took it all in, wide-eyed.

Then, the traveling bard entered. Yuta didn't recognize him, but he introduced himself as Takaba Fumihiko, and claimed to have traveled not only the country but the world. He played a few songs, which were mediocre at best in Yuta's opinion, and then apparently decided to tell jokes the rest of the time. No one but Gojo seemed to find him any sort of funny.

Now Yuta finally knew why the man had had that expression on his face - it had been in regard to the dinner entertainment, not the day filled with competitions. The castle inhabitants ended up talking amongst themselves and not paying attention for the most part. In the end, it hadn't ended up being even close to as bad as Yuta had feared.

The next morning, the Kamo and Zen'in mages left, either back to their clans or out on missions. Todo had given Itadori a bone-crushing hug before he left. Honestly, it probably would have broken the bones of anyone not reinforcing themselves with mana save Itadori and Maki with their physical prowess. The castle mages seemed slightly subdued after the parting. It was entirely unlike the prior year where the other mages had left with open hostility. Soon, they all went their own ways - Toge on a solo mission, Maki and Panda on a duo mission, and Yuta on an S-rank assignment in the far north.

xXxXx

"A murder investigation? Are we even qualified for that?" Nobara asked, inspecting her nails as she stood between Itadori and Fushiguro.

"It's a magically induced serial murder investigation, so yes," replied Ijichi, an assistant of the king who often helped brief mages sent out for assignment. The king had left right after saying farewell to the other young mages early that morning. Apparently there was some serious threat in the far southeast that urgently required his attention.

Ijichi handed them a scroll with all the details, which Fushiguro took. He was sort of the de-facto team leader at this point, as he was the most experienced mage between the three of them. "Yanroju City is a day's ride from Ikawa. So you won't be expected back for at least a week due to the travel time."

"I hope we can catch the killer before they strike again," Itadori told the two of them as they headed out to the stables. He took his job very seriously, especially when it came to saving others. Nobara thought it might circle back to his botched mission with Nanami before the other mages had come to the castle. She knew some civilians had been killed on that one.

"I hope I packed enough for the trip," Nobara said, hefting her sizable bag of belongings up behind her saddle.

"I hope I can get a few moments of peace on this trip," muttered Fushiguro.

"Peace during a murder investigation? I don't see how," Itadori commented. He clearly hadn't understood the dark-haired mage meant peace from his two companions on the journey. Nobara chose not to correct him in his assumption.

She and Itadori chatted most of the way to the first inn, where the first major argument of the trip between the group began. Itadori said they should get two rooms to save money and he would share with Fushiguro. Nobara was fine with it, as she still got her own either way. Fushiguro said he wanted his own room.

"We have enough coin, it's not a big deal," he insisted.

"I still think we should save when we can," Itadori retorted. It was likely due to his upbringing - poorer than either of the two of them. Nobara got the sense that she might have had the best upbringing of any of the group, though Fushiguro was rather tight-lipped about his younger years, only saying that he hadn't been staying at Castle Suga much until a few years ago.

Nobara sighed. "Let's see if they even have three open rooms and then make our decision. I'll flip a coin if I have to."

The inn did indeed have three open rooms, though they were the last three. This sparked further argument between the two young men, which Nobara solved with a coin flip. It fell in favor of Fushiguro, who sighed in relief. Itadori looked mildly disappointed. Nobara wondered why it had mattered this much to either of them.

Two days later, they reached Yanroju City and began their investigations. Three more murders had occurred since they had set out on the road. The pattern of one murder per night was holding. Each victim was killed in the evening by someone who claimed they had no knowledge of what had occurred. Some were relatives and friends, others complete strangers. No pattern could be determined just from the surface level investigation. They would need to dig deeper.

Fushiguro conducted the first interview with the other two mages present to observe, before they split up and interviewed the other perpetrators - well, the ones who had survived. Two had taken their own lives in shame after their crimes. Those were unfortunate dead ends according to the Ten Shadows wielder.

He had told them on the road of an investigation he had shadowed Okkotsu Yuta on - one of the few times he spoke, as typically Itadori and Nobara carried the conversation. They needed to look for any connections between the victims as well as connections between the perpetrators. It was likely there was some sort of vengeful spirit or cursed magical object causing these incidents. The fact that they were occurring so often and regularly, one after another night after night, was why they had been sent out in the first place.

"It's most important to get a feel for the life of the perpetrator or victim, what they do day to day, places they visit, people they see," Fushiguro explained before he sent them all out. If they were quick enough, they could prevent a seventh murder from occurring. The first man they had interviewed had not been able to tell them much. He had gone out drinking with friends at the local tavern, had a blank spot in his memory, and next thing he knew was his wife was dead by his own hand.

In the late afternoon, they regrouped and shared what they had found.

"So, the second murderer is one who killed herself after she killed her husband," Itadori told them all as they spoke in low voices over an early dinner at their inn. "I spoke to her son, who is around our age. He said that she went to the market as usual and came home. But then she went out again in the afternoon to collect some of her sister's belongings. Turns out her sister is the wife who was killed by the first guy. We wouldn't have figured that out on our own since their family names are different."

"That's a good first clue, well done Itadori," Fushiguro told him. He jotted some notes down on a scrap of paper with charcoal. Ink was too much a hassle to carry around, not to mention messy if the glass jar broke.

Itadori beamed at the praise, and Nobara took up the tale of her own investigations into the third and fourth murders. "The third and fourth murders both happened in tavern brawls. There were a lot of witnesses, and while I'm sure some of them exaggerated the story of the brawls, it does seem like something similar happened in each instance. The third murderer was drinking with friends, and after his third drink, he suddenly struck out at one of them with a knife. The brawl that followed was after the murder occurred, as they tried to restrain the murderer. I'm honestly surprised no one else was killed. He was wildly swinging the knife around according to their stories."

She shrugged, as if to say the stories could be exaggerations as she had mentioned earlier. "The fourth murder happened in the same tavern and was perpetrated by one of the men who tried to restrain the man the night before. Similar crime, seemingly no motive. Happened after his second drink."

Fushiguro looked contemplative. "These two seem to line up together like the first two, but I don't get how we went from some relatives being involved to some strangers in a tavern with no connections to the other two. The fifth murderer also killed himself after he realized he killed his own son. According to his wife, who witnessed the crime, he just came home and ran the boy through with a sword. Then he seemed to come-to and fell on his own sword right after. He was a town guard."

"Wow, that's…" Itadori trailed off.

"Horrible," Nobara finished for him.

"The last murderer wasn't found," Fushiguro continued. "Just a body in an alleyway between buildings. Looked like a vagrant of some sort. A member of the town guard found the corpse. It had multiple stab wounds to the chest. If it weren't for the other murders happening the days before, it likely wouldn't have been linked."

Nobara sighed and let her head slump down, only propped up slightly by her crossed arms which lay on the table. "So, we have two paired crimes which each fit together with their pair but not each other. Then we have two random crimes, and no way to put all six of them together is what you're saying."

Itadori looked like he was thinking very hard.

Fushiguro's eyes were looking up as though the answer was on the ceiling of the tavern. "Let's focus on the first four murders and try connecting them first. We already know the second murderer was the sister of the first murderer's victim. She went to the house to retrieve some of her sister's belongings. That makes me think there's a cursed object involved. The question would be what object? I doubt it's clothing or a weapon - the knives used in the first two murders were kitchen knives found at home. And the men at the tavern each carried their own knives. The fifth incident used a sword instead of a knife."

"I doubt it would be clothing either," Nobara put in. "The murderers weren't all male or female but a mix of both. So if someone cursed some cloth, I doubt it got remade into new clothing between each incident."

"What about a possession?" Itadori asked. "You know, like a ghost or something."

"Unlikely," Fushiguro answered. "Specters or revenants might try to carry out vengeance, but they usually have a specific target. These crimes aren't focused on one family or people who work together."

"A ghost that can hop around from person to person?" Itadori pressed on. He was obviously hung up on ghosts for some reason.

"We don't have to count it out," Fushiguro replied carefully. It was clear he disagreed with Itadori's ghost theory.

"The tavern," Nobara cut in. "The middle two both happened in the same tavern. We could go there to investigate further."

"What about the last murder? The street vagrant. Maybe we'd be better off hunting around for that killer," Itadori suggested.

"Checking out the scene of the crime wouldn't hurt," Fushiguro allowed. "Should we split up again? I can take the tavern, you two take the alleyway?"

Nobara crossed her arms, but before she could protest that she didn't need to be paired up with one of the men for safety, Itadori agreed and hurried out. She threw up her arms in exasperation and followed after him.

The alleyway was corpse-less now. The town guard that had found the dead vagrant had taken him out for burial already. Still, the two mages combed the streets around where they had been told the murder had occurred. Itadori went so far as to look under bins of rubbish and in all the gutters. Nobara preferred to use her mana detection. She eventually picked up a faint gleam. It was red.

"Itadori, check over there," she commanded, pointing to a gutter full of leaf debris he hadn't sifted through yet.

There was no answer.

"Not funny!" she snapped, spinning to tell the other mage off.

He wasn't there. Itadori Yuji had vanished into thin air.

Concentrating deeply, she felt for his peculiar aura of purple mana. It flickered faintly, moving rapidly away. She quickly moved to follow. The object with the ominous red aura lay behind her in the gutter, forgotten.

xXxXx

"Rescue him?" Megumi's mind was still reeling from Kugisaki's report. Itadori had been kidnapped and taken to 'some sketchy place'. "I don't get how he was kidnapped in the first place. He's better than either of us at hand to hand."

Kugisaki tapped her foot, clearly anxious. "Obviously they got the jump on him. His mana was flickering like he was asleep. I don't get why they didn't take me out too. I was down the street from him, but not that far…" Maybe whoever had taken Itadori hadn't known the two of them were together.

The Ten Shadows wielder rose. "Well, hopefully by the time we get there he's freed himself and we can get out of here. You never found the object causing the murders, did you? I got no leads at this place," he said, gesturing around at the tavern. It was a raucous place even though several brawls had ended in death the past week.

Kugisaki paled. "It's still in the gutter," she whispered. "But it's covered in leaf debris, whatever it is. If that's even it. It was glowing red like that cursed necklace was."

Megumi wanted to smash his face into something, but thought better of it. "It's fine for now. If that really is the object, it's best you didn't touch it directly. Would you have picked it up with something else?"

"Uh…"

He took that for a 'no' or a 'maybe', not a 'yes'. In that case, the thing was better off in the gutter than causing Kugisaki to go out and murder someone - likely either himself or Itadori. "We'll leave it for now. Getting to Itadori is the priority."

Kugisaki let out a breath and strode swiftly out the door of the tavern. Megumi followed, placing a few coins on the table to pay for his drink.

xXxXx

Yuji awoke in a dark room. He was slumped against a wall, legs bound before him in ropes covered in seals and arms tied similarly behind him. His skull throbbed like he had been hit with one of Todo's hardest punches. As he bowed his head, a bit of blood dripped from his face into his lap. He wasn't sure if there was a gash on his face or merely a bloody nose causing the drip.

The sound of a shoji door sliding open before him made him raise his aching head and squint to see what was happening in the darkness. A lamp was brought in and set on a desk at the far end of the room from him, and the door-opener knelt behind the table. The glow of the lamp illuminated the face of Guildmaster Star.

Yuji sucked in a breath. Why was he here? Granted, Yanroju was less than a day's ride from Ikawa, but still.

Lord Star gave him a twisted grin. "Yuji, Yuji, Yuji. You really thought you could get out of your debt by running away?"

The pink-haired mage didn't reply.

"The Guild of Assassins charges extra for kidnappings, you know. It's more of a hassle to bring in a mage alive."

Yuji's eyes sparked. "Were you so keen on keeping me around because you knew I was a mage?" he accused. "Is that why you had me running all those missions for you? Did you never train me properly so I'd just go on being your underling, never knowing what I was?"

The guildmaster tsked. "All these accusations. And after I so kindly took you in upon your grandfather's death."

"Answer the questions!" Yuji bellowed. He strained against the ropes binding him, but the tags on them must have been giving them some sort of magical strength if even his inhuman power could not break through them.

The man fixed him with a hard glare. "Yes. Yes. No."

The pink-haired mage blinked. Then he realized Lord Star had answered his questions, each in order. Yes, he'd kept him around because he knew he was a mage. Yes, that was why he'd been assigned missions for the guild instead of being kept at one of their hideouts doing more menial tasks. No, the guildmaster refuted that Yuji had never received training so that he'd go on being an underling who never knew who he was a mage. His eyes narrowed, suspicious of a lie. Was it possible the guildmaster had feared what he would become when he unlocked his true potential as a mage? Could that be the true reason he'd never trained Yuji? Sure, a mage underling would have been even more helpful to the guild, Yuji assumed. The only reason not to train him and keep him in the dark would be if Lord Star thought Yuji actually had a shot at surpassing him.

"So, you think I'll just come back to work for you after you kidnapped me?" Yuji spat. He kept his exterior angry as he internally thought things over. The other mages at the castle had been impressed by his rapid growth, but "You could have saved all that money if you'd just had me assassinated and called it even."

Lord Star barked out a laugh. "Oh no, I don't think so. But an assassination is just so… impersonal. This way I get to do it myself."

The guildmaster unsheathed a blade from his hip and began sharpening it on a stone on his desk. For the first time, Yuji could see the man's magical aura - a deep blue color. He must have released his hold on at least partially hiding it - Yuji had not felt the weight of it earlier. Lord Star was a powerful mage. Easily B-rank, maybe even A-rank if determined by magical quantity alone. Yet he had never seen the man use a lick of magic, not even so much as a mage-light.

Yuji struggled to reach his own mana and do anything with it, but it remained sluggish and distant, the ropes which bound him keeping not only his limbs but also his magic tied and helpless. He wondered if Kugisaki had noticed his disappearance and met up with Fushiguro yet. Surely the two of them would know he hadn't just run off on them.

He had to keep the guildmaster talking; buy them some time. "There will be people looking for me," he told the man. "It might take a few days, but I have friends at Castle Suga now. The king will send one of them looking for me, just you wait."

Lord Star raised an eyebrow. "The king is far too important a man to care about someone as insignificant as you, kid."

This only proved to Yuji that his former master didn't know the first thing about the king and simply assumed him to be like himself - self-absorbed and wielding power solely for his own benefit.

"Maybe not," Yuji fake-conceded to the man. "But my disappearance will be known and investigated. What would the consequences of that be for you and your guild? I'm pretty sure a mage running a gang of thieves is frowned upon by the powers that be."

The knife's steady sharpening paused before resuming once again. "In a few days you will be dead, and I will have returned to Ikawa. No residuals will be left behind, and your remains will be cremated."

Cremated. The ultimate insult to the soul which inhabits the body. Burial was practiced so the soul could return to the earth and eventually be either reborn as someone or something else or move on to a different plane - one of the heavens or hells. As Yuji scrambled around in his mind for a reply, shadows pooled in one corner of the room, and an eye peeked through. It was Fushiguro's familiar green shade and the pink-haired mage sighed in relief.

That was a mistake. Guildmaster Star looked up, obviously wondering why his prisoner would sigh in relief while he sharpened the instrument of his torture. He threw the knife toward the shadows and the eye, shadows, and knife all vanished. Yuji prayed it hadn't made contact with its target.

The knife must have indeed missed his friend's eye, as frog shikigami piled into the room, causing a disturbance. Lord Star slashed out at them and grabbed a paper from his desk. It turned into a sword. He leapt out of the shoji door behind him, obviously determining it would be more effective to go after the shikigami wielder than try to take out all the frogs, which continually melted into shadows around him as he slashed side to side at them with the katana.

Yuji strained once more against his bonds when Kugisaki appeared in the doorway. She held the guildmaster's knife in hand, and used it to saw through the ropes holding Yuji. "Come on. Fushiguro told us to go to where you got abducted after getting you free."

Rubbing his wrists and arms to get circulation in them once more, Yuji protested. "But Guildmaster Star is a powerful mage. I felt it earlier." He shivered. He knew Fushiguro was good - B-rank and looking to be promoted to A-rank as his power grew - but Lord Star was around that level as well.

"It's not far from here," Kugisaki assured him. "We'll go back to meet up with him as soon as we can - that's the plan at least. Then all three of us can team up on him. But first we have to get that object, make sure there aren't any more murders."

Yuji frowned, but followed her lead, albeit unwillingly. "Ok, but as soon as we get it we'll hurry right back."

He was unable to push the pace, as he didn't know where in the city they were compared to the place had been taken from. Frustration filled him until they finally reached a street he recognized. Kugisaki pointed him at the correct gutter (his own mana detection, while markedly improved, was not nearly at her level), and he collected the object with a scrap of cloth, placing it inside his haori's inner pocket.

"Okay, let's get back to Fu-" He abruptly cut off at the sight before him. Two figures - one more monster than human and one more human than monster - stood before them. Both their gazes were locked on the place Yuji had tucked the cursed gold coin, as though they had been drawn to it somehow.

The only good thing about the situation was that by now it was well into the night and the streets were deserted. He and Kugisaki immediately fell into fighting stances, he with his fists, her snatching up her hammer and taking some nails from the pouch on her belt.

"Pardon us," the humanoid one said. "We just need that coin. Our errand does not include killing mages. Just hand it over, and we'll be on our way."

Neither mage responded. Yuji gestured to Kugisaki that he would try to circle around their opponents and flank them. She nodded, and threw some nails imbued with mana out as an initial attack. Instead of one turning to face them and standing back to back, the more humanoid enemy pressed its back up against a nearby storefront, as though it didn't want to expose it to either of the two. Yuji used this to his advantage, sailing in fast to deliver a punch which bowled the man/thing over.

"Oh." Its back had another face on it, grotesque and dripping what looked like blood from the pit-like eyes. No wonder it wanted to keep it hidden. Though wearing more clothes would have helped in that matter - he was hardly wearing anything at all.

"You've seen it," the man hissed. Yuji decided to call it a man and the other one a thing to keep them straight in his mind. "Now I'll have to kill you even if you do hand over that coin!"

"Is that so?" the cool, confident voice of Kugisaki rang out. More nails flew, sent his way by her hammer.

The man wasn't perturbed by them. Bloody wings sprouted from his back, reaching from one row of buildings to the other, blocking the mages' escape. "Start running and turn your backs to me," the man said as the bloody wings shot forth toward the two.

"Kugisaki!" Yuji shouted, though she was right next to him, dodging the foul-smelling blood. "Don't let it touch you!"

"I know!" she yelled back.

The two mages ran the other direction down the street, away from the man and the thing. Kugisaki was starting to fall behind. "Can you go any faster?" Yuji asked.

"No way!" she panted. The foul blood was on its way to her, grazing the tips of her short hair at this point.

Yuji made an executive decision and scooped her up to carry her. She didn't protest as he thought initially she would, simply telling him "I've got your back," and holding securely to one of his shoulders.

He sprinted off at an incredible speed. He felt his passenger take in a sharp, surprised breath. He was determined to get out of the city and into the forest, where there would be no civilian casualties during this fight. As long as he held the coin, they would chase him.

When they finally reached the city walls, he leaped over with ease and stopped at the edge of the forest nearby. The forest directly surrounding Yanroju city had been cut back over the years, leaving a clearing. Now the two mages could see when their opponents would be coming.

"Well done, you deserve some praise," Kugisaki told him as he set her down.

Yuji chuckled. "Thanks."

"No really, I should be thanking you," she added a touch more sincerely.

"It's no problem."

The thing behind him hardly made any noise, but Yuji sensed it nonetheless. Its stomach was bloated as it crawled on all fours from behind cover. How had it gotten there so quickly?

Instinctively, Yuji pushed Kugisaki to the side and took the brunt of the disgusting spit attack of the thing. One eye was blinded and he wiped at it frantically.

"Itadori!" Kugisaki called out to him, concerned.

The next attack from the thing hit her in the back and left arm. It left burn marks. Yuji could tell she was in more considerable pain than him, despite him getting a facefull. It seemed his durability extended to poison as well.

"There's no need to worry. My younger brother's blood isn't the same quality as mine. You wouldn't even die from mine unless you were drowned in it." The man had caught up, and apparently was claiming to be the older brother of the thing. "But it does hurt like the Nine Hells. Our real magic starts now."

Dark red swirls twined up the two mages where they had been struck by the thing's blood attack. "Membranes. Wounds. If you take in one of our blood and if a brother activates the magic, decay will start spreading from the point of entry. I'd say about fifteen minutes for the young man and ten minutes for you, miss. By morning, only your bones will be left."

Not good, it was poison. But it was also magic. That meant it could be deactivated. Yuji wondered what his plan of attack should be, but before he could even think of something, Kugisaki spoke.

"Magic where you win if it hits, huh?" she asked, drawing out a nail from her pouch. "You guys sure are strong. But it's too bad… I'm a bad match for you!" Mana concentrated on the hand holding the nail, and she drove it through her wrist. Yuji gasped. But so did their two opponents. "Let's see who can hold out the longest, shall we? You don't like pain, do you? Hurry up and deactivate your magic already."

Yuji realized then that her magic, which linked to opponents, connected her to both of the brothers by their shared blood. Still, if it turned into a game of waiting, neither of them could afford to have it drag out for long. They would lose when their time ran out. He willed himself to move, gathering mana in his fist and swinging at the younger brother. At the same time, Kugisaki drove another nail into her arm.

They were quite the tag team. After a few more hits Yuji swapped sides with her. His punches had weakened the younger brother enough that she could probably finish him off while Yuji himself concentrated on the less injured elder brother.

The pink-haired mage could see the consideration on his opponent's face. Should he stop the magic or trust his brother to survive? As he attacked again, Yuji felt the magic stop. However, the elder brother used his wing attack from before - toward Kugisaki. With intense focus as well as muscle memory aiding him, Yuji's next punch landed with black sparks. He had hit a black flash, ripping the man's right arm off.

He couldn't have been fully human - he didn't react with the agony a normal human would have experienced, mage or not. The younger brother leapt toward Kugisaki, but she finished him off with her Hairpin attack, the nails she had used earlier shredding him as she activated the mana imbued within them. "Don't worry. I'll be sending big brother your way soon," she told the corpse at her feet.

Much to Yuji's shock, the elder brother began to cry. Those tears caused Yuji to hesitate in launching his next attack. The elder brother turned to flee without the coin. However, Yuji knew they had to win, not just let him escape. Kugisaki stepped up beside him and threw down one of her bundles of straw on the arm Yuji had detached with his black flash. With a single nail and the use of her resonance magic, the brother stumbled, and Yuji was able to catch up to him despite his slow start. His next attack struck true, ripping through the man's chest. He fell to the ground, lifeless.

"They weren't devils," Yuji said tonelessly as they stood over the two. The corpses weren't vanishing.

"They weren't humans either," Kugisaki stated, scowling at them. "Let's dump them further in the forest and go catch up with Fushiguro. And then you've got some explaining to do about this whole situation."

"Heh." Yuji scratched the back of his head but hurried to drag the bodies further into the forest, dumping them in some thick brush he doubted anyone would search any time soon. "Okay, let's go." Trying as this battle might have been, they needed to get on their way to help Fushiguro with Guildmaster Star.

xXxXx

"What's wrong, Choso?" Geto asked.

The pale, black-haired man had paused in the middle of moving a go tile. "My younger brothers are dead," he stated, snapping the piece in his hand.

"Hey, don't break the pieces!" Mahito berated from where he was sitting nearby. He had played earlier.

"So you can sense those kinds of things. What happened?" Geto asked curiously. The two had been sent to retrieve a cursed object as well as some barrier spikes. He hadn't expected much trouble, though it was possible mages had been sent to investigate the murder spree the coin was causing.

"I can't see that much detail, I just know they're gone," Choso told him. "Didn't you have any undead on standby there?"

"A few," Geto admitted. "It's not like I can share senses with them though."

He had other ways of getting the information though, and a letter arrived by raven several hours later informing him of Itadori Yuji and Kugisaki Nobara's role in the deaths of Choso's brothers.

xXxXx

"You think Itadori Yuji killed my brothers?" Choso had wondered what Mahito wanted to say to him in private. Though he and his brothers had chosen to side with Geto and the devils who had revived the three of them, he wasn't sure their vision of the world was the best for the future. However, there would at least be a place for the three of them in it. It was doubtful there would be such a place here in the world now.

"Itadori Yuji and Kugisaki Nobara. My sources were quite clear." Mahito's unhinged grin did not fit with his grim news.

"I see…" Choso trailed off. "What can you tell me about the two of them?"

The devil was quick to spill what he knew - a decent amount about Itadori, but next to nothing about Kugisaki besides a description. The Death Painting frowned; if he ever ran into the two of them, he would pay them back in blood for the deaths of his brothers, that was for certain.

Notes: Y'all probably thought I forgot about the Thieves Guild plot point from chapter 1. But I did not!