Chapter Text
ETERNAL SUMMER
⸻ 復讐は悲しみによって舗装された道である
( 16th April 2018 )
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Jujutsu Headquarters Notice
By order of the Jujutsu Headquarters of Japan, the following individuals have been evaluated by the Authority to be sentenced and/or investigated due to crimes and violations against the Memorandum Regarding Sorceror Duties:
01. Kurosawa Sayuri has opened the Gates of Hell in crucibles of cursed energy to incite chaos amidst the country with the propagation of cursed spirits. She is hereby branded as a traitor and permanently exiled from the realm of sorcery. She is hereby further sentenced to death.
02. The Kurosawa Clan is hereby excommunicated from the realm of sorcery following the transgressions of their clan leader. Involving the Kurosawa Clan in matters of the realm of sorcery will be considered an act of treason punishable by death.
03. Gojo Satoru is hereby considered a suspect under investigation by the Jujutsu Bureau of Criminal Affairs. He is hereby prohibited from leaving the country and such violation of the law will be punishable by death.
This Notice is issued on 16th April 2018 with immediate effect.
Hanajima Ryosuke
Inspector General of the Jujutsu Headquarters of Japan
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The society that they inhabit is black with rot. It seeps into every facet of their lives to taint and choke. Satoru does not need his Six Eyes to see that. He lives in a morally destitute world and anger burns through his veins to see Sayuri's name sullied and dragged through the mud. Thinking of the accusations made against her brings him immeasurable despair and fury. What right do these mortals possess to condemn a goddess? They know nothing of her divine nature or the veracity of her compassionate heart. Sayuri, who has devoted her life to her duties as both a sorceress and a wife, who places the people she cherishes above herself, who was willing to sacrifice her own soul for the man she loves. All they see is a pawn that they can manouevre at their behest.
Not for the first time, Satoru contemplates mass slaughter and he ultimately understands Suguru's stance even if he doesn't want to admit it to himself. Despite his reservations, he agrees that there is meaning to his old friend's absurd ideologies. He was there too, he held Riko's cold body in his arms, he saw the grief etched onto each of their mournful faces. It was him who spoke first of vengeance. Again, he tastes the hopelessness on his tongue with a keen awareness of his own inadequacies. Hanajima Ryosuke is clever, he hides behind his lap dogs amongst the sorcerer families knowing that if Satoru can't touch him then it would be a futile exercise of power on his part.
"This is so fucking ridiculous," Kinji sneers in front of the main building as he reads the notice. Satoru looks up from where he sits dejectedly on the steps leading to the entrance. The other third-year students are with him, alongside Kento and Karina. "There's no way Sayuri would do this by choice. Was there even a proper investigation?"
"They're just looking for an excuse to depose her and blame both the Kurosawa and Gojo clans," Kurumi states distastefully. "That's all those old men think about in there. That Hanajima bastard... he thinks he owns the entire sorcerors' society."
"Hey, Satoru," Kirara calls. "You should have just killed them instead of letting them spout this bullshit."
Satoru's eye twitches beneath his sunglasses as his lips curl in a sardonic smile. "If you think that will make a difference, be my guest, Kirara."
"I'm going to give them a piece of my mind," Kurumi fumes and barges into the building with Kinji and Kirara on her heel. Their voices fade into the distance as they begin to descend the stairs into the rotting bowels of the sorcerors' society. Not that anything they do would matter at this point and the only thing awaiting them is a suspension, if Hanajima's dogs are feeling so kind. Satoru doesn't bother stopping them.
He sighs and turns his gaze to Karina who is smoking a cigarette in a figure-hugging black dress and heels. She wears a matching fascinator in the shape of a spider lily with a netted veil over her eyes. He raises a quizzical brow in her direction. "Whose funeral are you going to?" he asks before bumming a cigarette off from her.
She lights it up for him and he takes a drag. "It depends," she answers. "The day is still young. Are you going to tell us exactly what happened, Satoru?"
He hesitates. Though he trusts them both, he's not sure how much he should divulge as well. The predicament he shares with Sayuri is a complicated one and he's not inclined to sit there explaining it all. "You know about the Kurosawa clan's thousand-year self-exile, don't you? The reason is that they've been harbouring the vengeful cursed spirit of their ancestor. That fucking spirit is a parasite that attaches itself to descendants born with the Gates of Heaven and Hell. It can take possession of their bodies and I think somehow, that's what happened to Sayuri."
"Excuse me, a—what?" Karina exclaims in disbelief. "How is that even possible? A cursed spirit possessing a jujutsu sorcerer?"
"The concept of the soul is still wholly unchartered territory," Kento states. "Even the workings of a jujutsu sorceror's brain is still a question mark that not even Ieiri Shoko or Yayoi Mirei can answer."
Karina appears disturbed by the revelation but reserves any further contemplation of existentialism. She shifts her weight onto a foot with a frown and focuses on the task at hand. "So... what are we going to do now?"
"There's only one thing to do, right?" Satoru sighs with a breath of fumes. "We have to find Sayuri and figure out a way to exorcise that spirit once and for all."
"The managers informed that one of her gates closed this morning," Kento tells him. "The one in Sakurajima. They haven't located its new position."
Satoru nods, taking note of the active volcano within Kyushu. He has a bad feeling in his gut but he pushes it away for now. "Thanks. Keep me updated."
Karina blows smoke in his direction. "You know if it comes down to it, I will always be on her side. Even if that gets me exiled and a death sentence too."
"Karina..." Kento starts unhappily. "Don't say unnecessary things like that."
"How is it unnecessary?" she asks indignantly. "It's my conviction."
Satoru spares them an amused glance. Karina has always idolised Sayuri since they were students and they have grown close in recent years. From her manner of speech, the way she carries herself with grace, and even the brand of cigarettes she smokes, Karina knows it all by heart. It is a fortunate foil against the doctrine instilled in her by the influence of both Zenin Toa and Hanajima Rei who had each turned their backs on the defective society that raised them. Since leaving Jujutsu High to pursue a frivolous career in entertainment, Karina wastes her days within their company, languishing in the same decay of decadence and hedonism that they thrive on. Her only saving grace is that she clings still to the past and the responsibilities she inherited of her own volition. It leads her to turn to Sayuri for guidance and enlightenment, something that Kento is still grateful for to this day.
He wonders if Sayuri knows exactly how much the people around them care for her. They see her as she is, someone that they can rely on and look up to. He envies her of it sometimes, that people can understand her so easily despite the nonchalant indifference she often portrays. Beneath it, her empathy is unquestionable and she knows all the right words to say to ease their minds. Unlike himself, he can never establish that mutual connection with anyone else but her. Even Suguru and Shoko often misconstrue his efforts at times.
"Good," Satoru says, tossing his cigarette butt aside and they turn their attention back to him. "She needs people like the both of you on her side."
Karina tilts her head slightly. "Don't discredit yourself, Satoru. I'm on your side too." He turns his gaze to her in mild surprise and she shrugs diffidently. "Only because I know I can trust you to do whatever it takes to bring her back, of course."
He chuckles drily at her words, knowing that he would go above and beyond to ensure Sayuri returns safely to them. Even if he has to walk through Yami no kuni once again a thousand times over and back, or tear through the very fabric of reality and the universe that encapsulates them. To deliver her from the ruinous curse that haunts them both and finally banish the demons of their ancient past. He wants them to live a life where they no longer have to look over their shoulders unsure of what the next day may bring. Where happiness is not just a fleeting, transient wish that ever eludes them.
He pushes himself to a stand and walks down the pathway. Karina and Kento follow him and he knows he can count on them to do the same. Sayuri, don't give up on yourself now when everyone is rooting for you, he silently prays for their sake. With the prison realm in her grasp, he doesn't know what to expect. Sayuri has enough regrets to fill the Sanzu River but she has been trying. He knows that she has. There's no other explanation to her sudden disappearance than the resurgence of Chizuru's cursed spirit. The only problem they have now is finding her.
"Kento, Karina," he starts. "Can you do me a favour? I would do it myself but I need to pay a visit to someone. I need you two to work with Homura on finding Sayuri. We think she's trying to birth cursed spirits from the fear of natural disasters. Here, use this."
He hands them a burner phone and Kento looks at him warily. "Those are usually cursed spirits of Special Grade status," he says.
"Yeah, so be careful," Satoru tells them. "If it's the three of you, I'm sure you'll be able to handle it somehow. But if anything happens to any of you on my watch, Sayuri will be upset and cry, and I don't want to see that. You got me?"
Karina rolls her eyes. "We'll try our best, my lord." Her snark bounces right off him.
"Just don't die," he says with a wave as he parts ways with them. Satoru makes his way to one of the entrances of the school where Ichiji awaits him in a car. The drive to Shinjuku offers him time to ponder their next course of action. He knows that Chizuru's sole purpose is to bring suffering onto himself and she will eventually find her way back to him. This miserable fate they share is sorrowing and he wants nothing more than to break its endless cycle of hardships.
The city crawls with cursed spirits that prey on the unwary and it's becoming a burden. Sorcerors are already spread so thin as it is and they aren't even able to seek help from the other prefectures. The negative energy spreading from the gates of hell seep through his skin, leaving him feeling as if he's been doused in the icy cold waters of the Three Crossings. The car finally pulls up on a quiet street away from the main road of Shinjuku and Satoru looks at a small nondescript sign of an antiques shop. Foreign curiosities are displayed in the window, ranging from ivory statues to lacquerware to scroll paintings dating back to the Heian era.
He steps out of the car and walks briskly into the shop. The door opens with a chiming bell and his eyes scan the rows of meticulously arranged antiquities on display. A man comes out of the office to greet him but the gracious smile on his face falls at the sight of Satoru at the threshold. His lips twist with displeasure and his brown eyes harden. "What do you want?" he questions sourly.
"Where's Toa?" Satoru asks.
Yayoi Aki frowns and he opens his mouth to retort when the sound of clicking heels interrupts him. His gaze diverts to the side as the woman walks out with a pipe between her slim fingers. Toa still does not look a day older than when Satoru remembers her as a child. Her heart-shaped face is radiant, her dark hair styled in short waves with crimson lips and smoky eyes that bear an insatiable hunger for life. Dressed impeccably in a Chanel black dress and matching Louboutins, he thinks she must have discovered the fountain of youth through her many industrious connections. The empire she has built for herself is illustrious and unrivalled. There is no other person alive who knows more of cursed tools and their origins than Toa. Her warehouses are stockpiled with rare and exotic treasures that no one else in the whole of Japan could ever compete with.
"Satoru," she greets him fondly as she exhales a puff of smoke into the air. The oriental blend of her tobacco smells like incense. "How funny to see you here. I was just thinking of you."
"Do you have some spare time?" he asks. "I need your help."
Toa raises a perfectly arched brow in his direction and barks out a laugh. "Gojo Satoru seeking my help? This must be my lucky day indeed. Aki, bring him around the back."
Aki begrudgingly opens the counter door and Satoru walks through. Toa motions for him to follow and they enter the back office. He sees crates stacked high against the walls, more paintings covered in canvas and a spread of priceless jewellery locked away in display counters. Toa brings him upstairs and there is a spacious sitting area decorated with luxurious furs. In another corner, there are rows of cubicles where people are busy arranging logistics and scouring the internet for interesting auctions. It doesn't escape his notice that they are all unregistered curse users. "You've been working hard," he comments.
She glances at him over a shoulder with a smirk. "I have a reputation," she replies. "I suspect that is the very reason why you've come to see me."
Satoru is further led up another flight of stairs until they finally reach her office. Here, Satoru sees the true fruits of her labour. The panelled walls and glass cabinets are filled with cursed tools that exude foreign and potent cursed energy. His eyes sweep across the room in awe, never having seen such precious artefacts within the repository of the Gojo clan or Jujutsu High. He thought the Inverted Spear of Heaven was a feat of cursed tool creation but Toa proves him wrong. Her collection is vast, some malevolent and swaddled in seals while others gleam brilliantly in the light with sacred vows. From the ancient temples of China and Parthenon of Greece, across the tribal plains of Africa to the unknown frontiers of the far west. He can trace their histories through the cursed energy they exude, each one painstakingly crafted through blood and tears and imbued with cursed techniques that have long passed into myth.
"How the hell did you manage to get your hands on all these?" he asks.
The smug expression on her face tells him everything that he needs to know. "Are you interested? Ever since Rei disappeared, I've been trying to look for a new successor."
"Pass," Satoru says dismissively. He proceeds to pull out the mirror that Chizuru had left behind and presents it to Toa. Its grotesque form is a testament to the grievances he has endured in the past week and its reflective glass gleams refulgent like a sinister new moon. "Do you know anything about this?"
The woman's eyes widen with something akin to fear and astonishment. She swiftly stands from the table, surprising Satoru as she grabs a cloth and throws it onto the mirror to hide its glistening surface. "Are you fucking insane waving that thing around?!" she exclaims.
"What the hell do you mean?" he questions heatedly. "I don't even know what it does."
She points a manicured finger at the object. "Never leave it uncovered, do you understand me? Satoru, where on earth did you find this?"
He musters every shred of patience he has to answer her, "Sayuri left this behind after..." His voice falters and a muscle in his jaw ticks. Satoru continues irritably, "Anyway, what is it?"
Her face pales and she slumps back into her seat. Realisation and understanding dawn across her features as she averts her gaze away from him. She retrieves her pipe from the table and takes a puff from it to recollect her thoughts. "It's called the Soul Revealing Mirror," she tells him. "Satoru, do you know what the Kurosawas used to be known for?"
He looks at her quizzically. "Other than the Gates of Heaven and Hell, you mean? What else would they be known for?"
"Their eyes," Toa says, tapping her temple to elucidate herself. "Their vivid crimson eyes are not just a hereditary mutation. It's not as rare as the Six Eyes but their eyes are known to see souls. I assume Sayuri has no idea how to use them but the Kurosawas are descended from the Shaman-Queen Himiko who could manipulate souls to her will. The legend goes that she had a twin that she ate in the womb, merging their souls into one body. To prevent her sister from possessing her, she crafted that mirror to trap souls."
Satoru's eyes widen as he looks down to the artefact in his hands. Suddenly, it all makes sense and he curses Chizuru in his heart. He feels the breath still in his chest with an ache that radiates through his very soul. His voice is tremulous as he speaks, "Are you telling me... that Sayuri's soul could be trapped in this mirror?"
Toa watches him carefully. "I heard about what happened, Satoru. From what you're asking me, it means that something is possessing Sayuri's body right now. Am I correct?"
He ignores her question with a frown but his silence in itself is an admission to the truth. "How do we release her?" he asks.
"There are two ways," she tells him. "Use the mirror to trap the spirit possessing her, releasing Sayuri's soul in return. Or shatter the mirror, reverting their souls into one entity."
She stands from her desk and Satoru watches as she unlocks the Inverted Spear of Heaven that he had entrusted into her care all those years ago. Walking around the room, she then picks a wakizashi from its hooks and hands it to him too. "The Inverted Spear of Heaven will destroy it. As for this, I've imbued it with my cursed technique. The Divine Move can only be used once though so be wise about it."
Toa is not the cruel woman she pretends to be and she looks at him now with a flare of sympathy in her dark eyes. It brings back memories from his childhood days when she would sit with him in the gardens with a box of wagashi, laughing with Akira and dreaming of a future that none of them could ever have. "Satoru... I can't imagine this will be easy even for you. So good luck."
"Thanks, Toa..." he murmurs.
She pauses beside him and her face pinches with an abstract emotion that he can't describe. "How's Megumi?" she asks quietly.
Longing for those halcyon days of his youth fills his heart with regret. For a brief moment, he wonders what things could have been like if Akira was still alive and Toa had never been inflicted with the wound of betrayal from the man she had once loved. The man who had ruined everything for them both, that had torn away every semblance of peace he may have had. They are the only family he has ever known before Jujutsu High, before he married Sayuri. He can still feel the sting of it and he knows Toa regrets it too. That instead of giving that man her heart, she should have driven a knife through his first.
If Satoru had known of it earlier, he may well have done it for her. But now they live in the ashes of the house that Zenin Toji had burnt down. He feels the effect of his presence in their lives ripple throughout his entire being, tainting even the pristine memories that he shares with Sayuri. Even now, he haunts them still. Like a black stain or shadow that none of them could ever remove from their hearts.
"He's doing well," Satoru tells her. He collects the cursed tools and stands to his feet. "He asks about you sometimes."
A bemused smile graces her lips. "And what do you tell him?"
"That you're just some crazy lady obsessed with him," he says with a teasing smirk.
She rolls her eyes. "Get out. You've already taken up too much of my time."
He grins and begins to leave when he senses a tremendous pulse of cursed energy from their vicinity. It licks at his skin, causes the hairs on the back of his neck to stand on end. Toa looks around in alarm as well and Satoru immediately rushes out of the office. He jumps down the stairs and slams his shoulder against the front entrance. His feet come to an abrupt halt when he sees a large star hanging above them in the sky with blinding ferocity. Rays of light engulf the entire wards of both Shinjuku and Shibuya, obstructing the traffic and throwing the streets into disarray. Karina. Her unmistakable cursed technique swirls with a wanton mass of cursed energy. He uses his infinity to bring himself close to its source and he sees crowds of non-sorcerors cower in fear and run blindly amok to escape the heat of the celestial body.
Satoru sees Karina below the epicentre of the star she created in the middle of the Shibuya crossing. Her entire body surges with uncontrollable cursed energy as she struggles to keep herself upright. Her screams of anguish echo through the streets and her knees crash against the ground beneath the force of her own powers. The star starts to collapse into a supernova, ethereal flares escaping its singularity in a dance of luminosity, and Satoru surges forward. Even with his infinity, the gravitational force of her star threatens to pull him into its core. At the back of his mind, he knows the reason for her sudden plight.
He reaches her and grabs her arm. Her eyes turn to him with terror and fear. "Karina, I'm sorry," he says quickly before rendering her unconscious. She falls limply into his arms and the star above them disperses in a shockwave of glimmering stellar remnants.
Before anyone can see them, he carries her away to the top of a nearby building and puts her down. He looks up and searches the horizon, immediately seeing what he sought to find. Chizuru stands on the opposite rooftop, her dark hair swirling in the brisk wind. Her scarlet eyes sparkle with mirth as a malicious smile spreads across her lips. The face of his beloved stares back at him without an ounce of remorse and his hands tremble with renewed fury. Chizuru opens a gate of heaven and she turns with a wave of her fingers to disappear into the currents of the abyss.
The sight of her back walking away from him is a familiar sight. It brings back the memories that he revisits often in the dead of night, interpolated with the last images he keeps of Suguru. Those moments, burnt to the back of his retinas and ingrained within his soul, leave him gasping for breath. Clinging onto the summer of their schooldays and the bright smiles that are the only things that he wants to remember them by. They flash before his eyes, like the unlimited void he conjures with his own hands, the memories fill his mind and render him immobile with its bitter melancholia. The days he spent at Sayuri's side after retrieving her from the lands of purgatory start to wither away. He needs her back in his arms with such painful longing that he wants to tear at his own flesh.
His phone rings and he picks it up to hear Kento's distressed voice on the other line. "Satoru? Was that you? Is Karina with you? Is she alright?"
"I have to take her back to Ren," Satoru replies. "She won't survive if we leave her like this. Meet me back at Jujutsu High."
He shakes himself free of the ghosts that plague his mind then picks up Karina and brings her back to the school. Mercifully, both Shoko and Ren are in the medical facility. Satoru lays Karina on a gurney and Ren blanches in shock when she steps up to the woman. Her hands hover over Karina as she attempts to reign in the cursed energy that is escaping her convulsing body in tidal waves. "W-what happened? I've never seen anything like this before. Her cursed energy... it's going haywire!"
"Satoru... this is Sayuri's cursed technique." Shoko looks at him with a trembling gaze.
He grits his teeth and rubs an aggravated hand across his eyes. "Yeah," he breathes out.
"Don't tell me it's true..." she whispers, her voice barely audible in the air. There is fear in her eyes, as if history is repeating itself once more. As if another one of them has fallen prey to the injustices of this world and the breaths escaping her lips quake her entire body.
Satoru grabs her by the shoulders and he feels dismay claw up his throat. His blue eyes betray the frantic agitation he feels as he speaks, "Don't look at me like that, Shoko. This is Sayuri we're talking about! She would never do what he did. She would never leave us for something like that, you know it!"
"Then what happened?!" Shoko raises her voice angrily. "Stop leaving me in the dark like this, Satoru! She's my best friend and yet I never know a singl—" She stops when she sees his face crumple with despair.
Satoru feels a weight against his shoulders from her words and his knees buckle beneath it. He falls heavily onto the bench behind him as he buries his face in his hands. His chest constricts tightly as the burden of the world crushes him beneath its heel. He feels so helpless and he can't help thinking that it's happening all over again too. His incapability to protect the ones he loves, to stop them from destroying themselves, to fail them over and over.
"Shoko..." he starts. "Do you think this is all my fault? If she had never left in the first place, would none of this have happened? Suguru had always depended on her for the emotional support that he needed, I knew that. She was the only one who could have helped him. I knew it even after she left but I never stepped up to fill the hole that she left behind. I never went to look for her. If I had told her that I knew about the curse between our clans, would she have stayed and allowed me to help her? If I—"
"Satoru," she interrupts impatiently. "Are you hearing yourself right now? What the fuck are you saying? Can you actually talk to me for once in your life?"
He looks up from his hands and realises how pathetic he must sound. "I'm sorry, Shoko. I didn't mean to... ( forget about you ) ...I'm just trying to process everything myself."
Her expression softens and her rigid stance relaxes back to its usual calm demeanour. "You're not alone, Satoru," she says gently. "You're not the only one that wants to bring Sayuri back. Whatever it is, you have to tell us instead of doing things on your own like you've always done."
"I know..." he murmurs. "I know that." But his heart aches too much to even speak of it. He brings out the mirror to show it to her, making sure it's still wrapped tightly within the cloth. "I went to see Toa. There's a high chance that Sayuri's soul is trapped in this cursed object. The one possessing her body now is Chizuru."
"The cursed spirit that haunts her, right?" Shoko frowns with perturbation. "But if Sayuri's soul is stuck in there... what can we do to free her?"
"We have to use it on her or shatter it," he says while shaking his head. "But you see what she can do. Chizuru can open both gates of heaven and hell, she's not just any force to be reckoned with. It was thanks to her that Ryomen Sukuna was defeated in the first place. I don't want anyone else getting hurt for Sayuri's sake. She would never forgive herself, you know that."
"She would never forgive herself if something happened to you too," Shoko says quietly. "This isn't something you can fix on your own, Satoru. It's gotten beyond that point now."
Her words sound hollow to his ears. Satoru has always been alone. It is an ugly and obscene pride that is the price of the divinity he carries with the title bestowed on him. Heralded as a god who walks a lofty path honoured beyond heaven and earth, if not him then who? Grief eats him from the inside out. It feels as if he has lived through a series of remorse, of wrong choices and irreversible mistakes. He loses confidence in the face of the person he loves standing on the opposite end of a battlefield. The fates are cruel to pit lovers against one another, to corrupt the sanctity of their bond. He does not even know how to breathe air that she does not exhale. And all he can feel is this empty suffering.
