Chapter Text
“This is an all-out war! This time, we'll definitely exorcise the Curse User ‘Geto Suguru'! …He's definitely saying stuff like that, that muscle-head director,” Suguru chuckles to himself as he ponders what kind of reaction the others are having at his little night parade.
Knowing them, they're too cautious to call him out on his bluff. Enough curses to take down the entire Jujutsu Society? Sure he has enough in quantity but quality? Not so much.
He has enough to act as a distraction while he gets his main objective, The Queen of Curses. Suguru never intended on declaring a proper war against the sorcerers, he's too disadvantaged to do that.
Even if Satoru couldn't go all-out because of the civilian locations he chose, the man is still too big of a threat. The chances of victory for him and his small group of Curse Users are so miniscule he might as well have surrendered on the spot.
Logically, there’s no possible way for him to win this supposed war if he truly declared it but that’s also a crucial part of his plan. There’s no way they would use an ace like Okkotsu Yuuta in a war they already have a high chance at winning.
So this Night Parade… It's the perfect distraction to get the annoying ones out of school and leave the students alone.
Miki's connections told him that Ryona is still abroad on his mission so there's no one to protect the children. While his family dangles loud distractions over the sorcerers, he shall break in.
Today, his ideals will become reality. Once the Queen of Curses is in his grasp nothing can stop him from creating his Monkey-free paradise for sorcerers. Now… To find Okkotsu.
“Oh. So you were here,” Suguru rubs his neck lazily, irked by the sight before him. The monkey in Satoru's class blocks his path with a simple cursed naginata.
It's voice grates on his ears, once again Suguru wishes he could make his wish come true faster. The monkey's stance changes to a fighting one and he stifles a yawn, not wanting to breathe in too much monkey stench.
“Sorry, but I don't have time to talk to monkeys,” he summons a short barrage of curses and watches as the useless monkey helplessly gets overwhelmed.
A worthless monkey indeed. Even when it wields a weapon and dons glasses to see curses, it still can't deal with them at all. Even Utahime could have dealt with such a barrage and she's not even a combative sorcerer. Hell, Shoko could hold out longer than that useless monkey.
Whatever. That's not his concern anymore, he has to find Okkotsu and capture the Queen of Curses once and for all. For the girls’ future, for the sake of all future sorcerers to come.
“Oops,” Suguru turns to face the disturbance of his cursed energy. Someone broke into his curtain, to make a hole like that they must be either quite the brute or decently skilled at cursed energy manipulation.
He supposes things can't always go according to plan, but such a small insect breaking in wouldn't change much. Now should he leave it or go squash it before it can cause any real damage? Decisions, decisions…
The choice was made for him when the cursed doll and cursed speech user broke through the walls to face him head on.
As expected of Ryona's students, they're strong! Breaking through all the walls for a shorter path, how interesting! The cursed corpse's impressive display is short-lived when it catches sight of the monkey Suguru dealt with earlier.
“You're distracted,” he kicks the corpse roughly and connects it to a punch to the back of its head, the doll collapses head first into the ground and calls out for its classmate in a last ditch effort.
Suguru moves back but the doll has a firm grasp on his ankle. Shit, he realises the cursed speech user was waiting for an ambush.
The man quickly moves to cover his ears but the child is faster. “Get crushed!” Inumaki's command makes the ground collapse as Suguru's body gets crushed as if an anvil had fallen from above.
“...Geh,” Suguru coughs as he summons his curses. A kirin-type creature helps him recover, the RCT is cold and not as comfortable as when Shoko used to heal him.
“Ehe… What would you two do without me?”
Her cheerful voice comes to mind. Back then Shoko, him, Satoru, and Ryona… They could smile without a care in the world. Before the corpses piled up, before Amanai's murder, before those monkeys hurt his family.
Breathing eases when the curse fixes his lungs and head. Suguru gets up, the display of camaraderie between the cursed corpse and the cursed speech user is exactly the kind of world Suguru wants.
No more protecting monkeys. Sorcerers helping sorcerers, a beautiful world where no one will have to experience being shunned and called cursed because of how they're born.
Naive little children, Suguru emerges from the hole in the ground. Satoru's students look at him in shock, truly believing they had incapacitated him.
After that display, the cursed speech boy is too spent to use his abilities again and the doll already proved itself to be a poor match against Suguru's martial arts prowess.
The pair claw and cling to this futile attempt of victory, the doll stalling for time whilst the cursed speech user tries to hurt Suguru. But even though they've tried their hardest, he's overwhelmed them in every aspect.
How wonderful, Suguru can't help but tear up at the sight. His dreams, they're playing out right before him! They hastily came back to save Okkotsu, fighting to the point of self-sacrifice! What respect, what honour!
The world he wished for… It's right before his eyes. He can almost grasp it, it's right before him now. All he has to do now… Is take the Queen of Curses from Okkotsu.
“...Maki…?”
Suguru turns to his target, a poor innocent child who was shunned by society for being a sorcerer. In another life, perhaps he and Okkotsu could have been allies.
If he had noticed the boy sooner, he could have had a happier childhood. Surrounded by fellow sorcerers who love him for who he is. No more fear, no more isolation. Just love and acceptance in their little monkey-free world.
“Truthfully, Okkotsu, I wanted you to live and see this,” he watches as the boy's eyes flicker between his fallen comrades. He's too softhearted, too willing to be exploited by monkeys even though all they've done is hurt him. “But this is all for the future of the sorcery world.”
Maybe if their circumstances were different, Okkotsu would have given up Rika willingly.
“Come… Rika…!!!”
But that’s not their reality.
“I shall kill you.”
“I'll fucking kill you.”
As a doctor, she's seen her fair share of corpses. Children, elderly, young adults. For Ieiri Shoko, death is a constant in her profession. Especially as a sorcerer, the corpses pile up before her, some come in alive and leave dead. Most are too unrecognisable from their death to recognise them by something other than their mission or cursed energy.
For the first time since her 3rd year in Jujutsu Tech, Shoko finds herself shocked by a corpse on her operation table. Logically, she is aware that death comes for every sorcerer. No matter how strong you are, only a rare few live and die in old age.
Her close friends especially. Geto, Gojo, and Ryona. Three Special Grade sorcerers that are considered the strongest special grades right now. One, born with a generational technique and destined for success. Another, with cursed energy control so precise it's almost as if no attack was made. And the weakest, born with a technique that can potentially destroy nations with ease.
With such strong skills, techniques, and all being Special Grades, Shoko naively believed that she would never have to operate on any of her friends.
“Ieiri,” the calm voice of her senior brings her out of her daze. Shoko takes a drag of her cigarette before extinguishing it. Ryona returned from his mission a day after Geto's death.
His corpse was being preserved by Shoko and Gojo while they waited for the older man. It didn't feel right to send Geto off without him, Ryona was the closest to the boy and also the boy's idol. Now that he's here, she can begin her autopsy.
The atmosphere in the sterile room is cold and thick with silence. Geto's body is in poor shape, Okkotsu's attack evaporated his right arm and the surrounding flesh was rendered bruised and purple.
Ryona has a distant gaze when Shoko begins the organ check, she starts with his torso. The intestines, stomach, liver, kidneys…
One by one, she removes his organs and weighs them. The parts close to the attack caused by Okkotsu appear more rotten and unhealthy than the rest.
His digestive track is more interesting, they absorb cursed energy efficiently and she suspects it's due to his cursed technique. There's not many abnormalities in his organs aside from those observations.
With the autopsy completed, she puts the organs back in and sews Geto up. Her gaze lingers on the ‘X’ shaped scar on his chest from his 2nd year. Her healing ability wasn't the most refined back then, these days she could probably heal an injury like that without a scar.
Ryona and Gojo silently help move Geto's body onto a gurney. A window waits at the side for them to finish so they can bring the body for cremation. Shoko removes her gloves and tosses them away, moving next to her friends as they look at Geto's corpse.
“I don't think he's going to have good karma in the next life,” Gojo quips half-heartedly, the usual energy in his voice gone and replaced with uncharacteristic somberness.
Ryona offers an amused scoff in response before he steps toward the corpse. “I'm sorry we couldn't help you, Geto. Thank you for being my student and trusting me, may you move on peacefully,” He lowers his head and brings his hand together in prayer.
The other two join him, offering silent prayers for Geto's passing before giving the window the Okay for his cremation.
“Wait,” Ryona raises his hand and severs Geto's neck from his body. “Just… A precaution. You may go now.”
The window pushes the corpse away, leaving an air of unease in the room. Shoko looks at her senior, his face looks much more tense than when she was dissecting her classmate. Something seems off, hopefully it's just her gut lying to her.
Life as a window is relatively calm, all things considered. For Ijichi Takeru, he's just happy he's not on the front lines and risking his life. Something's definitely wrong with his cousin, Kiyotaka, but at least that guy gained his senses again and quit trying to be a sorcerer.
Windows don't exactly have it easy though, since they have to handle the civilians and sorcerers alike. Thankfully for Takeru, Mr. Haibara is a pleasant man who always completes his reports on time and doesn't need him to hound the man for it.
…Unlike poor Kiyotaka and Mr. Gojo. How does he have the stomach for him? Takeru thinks back to the cold room where Ms. Ieiri performed an autopsy on the Curse User.
Just standing near Mr. Gojo put Takeru on edge. Actually dealing with the man and his famously strange temper? Hell. Kiyotaka's heart is so much stronger than his.
The ominous clacking noise of a walking stick makes Takeru jump, “I'll take it from here young man…”
Takeru sheepishly turned around to find an old sorcerer with a servant next to him. He notices the crest on their haoris and gulps at the realisation of who's in front of him.
“I- I- I'm sorry b-but I was instructed to bring the body straight to the crematorium,” Takeru lowers his head, bowing as deep as he can without kneeling.
“That’s too bad,” the Izuru elder chuckles, seemingly amused. Takeru takes that as a good sign and looks up before the atmosphere grows heavy and he's forced onto his knees by overwhelming pressure. He can't breathe, the air in his lungs feels almost compressed and it feels like an anchor is crushing him from above.
Not just him, the servant that came along with the elder was forced down as well. Izuru looks down at him with a sinister smile, “I suppose I'll just have to get rid of evidence.”
I don't want to die... Takeru crawls forward pitifully, his fingertip grazes the man's shoe. He forces himself to look up and plead, the cold and clinical gaze of the Izuru elder tells him there is not room to negotiate.
“N… No please wait-!”
Report:
December 2017, Tokyo Prefecture, Tokyo City
Mission Summary
Subjugation of the Special Grade Curse User(Geto Suguru) who declared a Night Parade of 1000 Curses.
- Curses were distributed in Kyoto and Tokyo, 20 civilian casualties
- Curse Users cooperating with Geto Suguru fled, none captured
- Geto Suguru was executed by a Special Grade(Gojo Satoru)
Though December ended on a somber note, time waited for no one as the days passed into the New Year's. Finally free from his overseas missions, Yuuji returns home.
““Makoto!”” His parents greet him together at the entrance, a servant takes his luggage and his father comments on his strong build.
Shinji nods to himself, “You've become a fine young man.”
“I prayed at the shrine today for your future match!” Jinka clasps her hands together in delight, looking at her son with an eager gaze. These days, all she's been asking Yuuji is if he's found himself a girlfriend.
He's not sure how to break it to her that he's not interested in any romance… It'd just be weird, wouldn't it? He's mentally 83, technically 107, and anyone in his ‘appropriate’ dating pool are like kids to him.
Maybe he could get with someone older than him? Maybe 50 or so? At that age he's not really seeing them as young anymore.
If I got with anyone it really would just be weird, He offers her a tense smile and lets himself get dragged inside so his family can poke and prod him with all their familial care.
His father asks if he'll participate in the clan's New Year's banquet and he nods. “I want to get some connections, the boy Satoru took under his wing uses shikigami and neither of us know how to help him,” he explains simply.
Jinka urges him to sit at the table with her as the servants pour tea. “You have the Haibara child, no? His clan's been using shikigami for years.” She thanks the servants for bringing the snack tray and dismisses them from the room. “Though I suppose more viewpoints will be helpful.”
Shinji strokes his thriving goatee. “I doubt you'll find out much,” he shrugs and takes a sip of the steaming beverage. “But it's good to see you doing your best for the students, Makoto.”
“I'm surprised there's so many children from clans in the school though,” Jinka cups her cheek. Normally, clans raise their children themselves. The sorcery schools were only started because no clan wanted to share their resources with a nobody who doesn't have their blood.
Because of that system, the schools are more seen as ‘charity work’ than anything. Their only merit is that the Higher Ups have more control over the students there, which meant the students spent less time learning in a room but instead being out in the field.
Yuuji would know, he's extremely familiar with it. I'll be damned if they give Megumi's class the detention centre again, he frowns and clicks his tongue. Annoying old coots.
Wait, can't I just prevent myself from eating the finger?
…Why didn't he think of that? Or did he, but he just forgot? The root cause of it all is his younger self eating Sukuna's finger. Even if Geto's body is… disposed of, Kenjaku can still pull strings and then the culling games will happen anyway.
He's been keeping a very loose tab on his younger self anyway, why didn't he think of that sooner?
“Are you eating properly, Koto? I swear, you look so thin every time I see you,” Jinka leans forward intently, shoving snacks into Yuuji's hands to eat.
Shinji sighs and places a hand on his wife's. “You're imagining it, he's just a muscular boy. Look at him,” the man grabs Yuuji's arm and squeezes his biceps with a proud expression. “When I was in my prime I was also well built.”
I used to be even more muscular when Kenjaku did weird science experiments on my body, and oh how he misses those days. It's just nice to have that fast recovery and inhuman endurance, sure his pain tolerance is still good but he's so tired after getting in a fight.
He used to be able to just take a nap and most wounds would be gone but now he's out of commission for a good few days when he breaks a bone. Also, muscle strains are a thing? They never happened to him before, he never understood just how painful they are.
And he gets sick now? Throughout his entire life as Yuuji, he's never ever had a fever! Not food poisoning or anything. And yet now… he’s defeated by mildly spicy food. Great.
But there's no point in dwelling on another life. Yuuji excuses himself from the room to retire to his childhood bedroom, the bitter and woody scent of incense still lingers in the halls of the clan estate. Oddly enough, the bitter smell in the air reminds him of Wasuke.
His grandfather used to smoke a lot, he got his cigarettes from the pachinko and sometimes he even got snacks for Yuuji. It's a pity he can't talk to his grandfather, it would be too odd. They're just strangers now, no blood between them except maybe a very vague soul-link through Sukuna?
The layout of his room hasn't changed, it seems Shinji ordered the servants not to change anything even though Yuuji's already moved out. I rarely even visit, he chuckles to himself as he dials Satoru's number.
He can't imagine being a father at all. He vaguely raised Megumi and Tsumiki alongside Satoru but giving them an apartment and checking up on them once a week doesn't feel like much parenting.
I'm sorry I couldn't take care of Megumi for you, Yuuji sighs somberly. Every time he thinks of Megumi he can't help but think of the sorcerer killer. That's… Well, he's the first proper human Yuuji's killed.
Mahito's deformed humans are already too gone to be fixed and Shibuya… That’s technically Sukuna. Even though it's all Yuuji's fault he escaped. He just doesn't know what happened when he killed the sorcerer killer.
He saw Satoru nearly dead, his curse energy disappearing and everything. Yuuji didn’t really think much before he blindly sent a Dismantle at the man. Even after he was bisected, the sorcerer killer cared enough about Fushiguro to ask him to take care of his son for him.
“Yo, Makoto,” Satoru picks up his phone. His voice sounds lax and there's the sound of rubble and vaguely explosive in the background.
“You didn't have to pick up if you were on a mission, you know?” Yuuji smiles softly when his friend brushes it off. Just a Grade 1 mission, no big deal, he says. Even though most sorcerers would be taking it very seriously.
Well, Yuuji has no right to speak on that. He doesn't even take his hands out of his pockets half the time.
They chatter for a bit, Satoru's mission ends and he can vaguely hear Ijichi on the other end urging Satoru to head to the next mission location.
“I won't take up more of your time. By the way, if Megumi ever gets a mission to retrieve Sukuna's finger in Sendai, tell me before he goes?” An oddly specific request but how else was he supposed to word it?
“Ehhhh? You worry too much, Megumi will be fiiiine. We taught him everything he knows!” Satoru answers lightheartedly before agreeing to the promise.
Well, hopefully his friend will remember to uphold that promise…
Extra:
Gojo walks up to Megumi's house
Meg: Who are you?
Gojo: (EW HE LOOKS LIKE THAT HOMELESS BUM WHO KILLED ME)
Introducing themselves
Koto: (omg Fushiguro is so cute and baby???)
Koto: call me Gramps!!(Jii-chan)
Tsu: Jii-chan!
Meg: (wait this is a respectable adult…)
Meg: …Ojii-san(Grandfather)
Koto: eh?
*he was thusly called Grandfather by Megumi
Shikigami
Meg: (summons divine dogs for the first time, they're puppies)
Koto: *officially dead*
Runaway
Geto: I don't want to be nice to monkeys >:(
Miki: well, you kind of have to
Geto: but I no no wanna (grabs Shiu Kong to start his cult)
Miki: think about it, you'll be able to hide easier like this
Geto: ugh, fine :(
Baby Panda
Yaga: (makes Panda)
Koto: so… he grows up…
Baby Panda: goo goo ga ga
Koto: *dies*
The Better Teacher
“Who's the better teacher between Mr. Gojo and Mr. Ryona?”
Maki: Ryona, because he's not insufferable
Panda: Gojo, he's funny.
Inu(written): Ryona understands my speech very well, it's easier to communicate with him.
Okk: Ryona makes the curriculum very easy to understand!
Gojo: just tell me you hate me already </3
Maki: I hate you