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“Itadori? Where are you going off to now?”
Yuuji looks up from where he’s rummaging in his closet for his jacket to Megumi, standing in the doorway with a cranky expression.
“Fushiguro! You’re looking good, as usual,” he laughs, holding a thumb up. “I got an order from the higher-ups to retrieve a special-grade cursed object. Even though they’ve already sent Satoru!”
Fushiguro picks up Itadori’s phone, checking through it. “Is it a finger? Of course you should be getting it.”
“I mean, sure, but Satoru’s goin’ anyway,” he complains. “He’s more than capable of handling a Grade 2 curse already. Don’t know why they insist on making me go babysit him.”
Fushiguro sighs, rubbing the back of his head. As he walks away, clicking off his equipment, he says, “They’re just worried Satoru will get distracted and fuck off to do something else. Go be a teacher.”
Well. He certainly has a point.
Satoru, for all his power and intelligence, is not the best at solo missions, solely due to having no one to police him. Hopefully, he’ll be able to focus better in Jujutsu Tech, but Yuuji’s still a little worried about that.
Teaching is a daunting task, even if that phrase is something that Fushiguro always scoffs at him for saying. Sure, he’s been one for several years now, and the kids are usually easy to handle, but Satoru is a special case. Special-grade, to be exact.
He’s known the kid for years, always hanging around Megumi and annoying the stony-faced sorcerer, but to be teaching him is a different matter.
Yuuji has no doubt that he and Satoru can get along well- he’s light-hearted and easy to talk with, but the matter of actually being able to teach him the human qualities and restrictions of jujutsu sorcery is something he doesn’t want to think about, most days.
Just thrash the kid once, Sukuna scoffs in his head. Arrogant types like him can always learn from a beating.
Yuuji doesn’t usually bother answering those types of questions from the King of Curses, but this one rubs him wrong.
“Don’t be stupid,” he snorts. “He’s still a kid. I’m what? Twelve years older than him? Unlike you, I don’t get off on hurting small children.”
Okay, then. Don’t take my advice, Sukuna sneers. You know I’m right.
“I didn’t ask,” Yuuji mutters, finally finding the standard high-collar jacket and shrugging it on. He opens the window outside of his room, jumping out with grunt. They’re only three stories up, anyways.
Outside, it’s warm, balmy in the way only Summer nights can be. He squints down at his phone, red dot marking where Satoru was sent to retrieve the cursed object.
“Right, then. Think I could make it there if I jump?” he asks, already shaking his legs out.
Sukuna doesn’t answer, but, well, he wasn’t looking for one anyways. The curse is probably sulking in that domain of his. Yuuji makes sure that he’s standing on grass (the last jump he tried on concrete ended in him paying damages), and gathering his curse energy, he leaps off with an exhale.
x
Geto Suguru is not having a good night.
First, he came home to his room ruined by one of the annoying monsters, or as he’s taken to calling them, demons. Second, the enormous presence he’d felt half an hour or so ago ended up to be at his school, ending with him having to save two of his weird classmates.
And now, some guy even weirder than the occult club members has showed up in terrible sunglasses (it’s past eleven pm!) demanding to let him arrest Suguru without a fuss.
He hasn’t had a day this bad since the incident at the beginning of the year.
Rubbing the bridge of his nose, he turns back to annoyance number three.
“What the fuck do you mean, arrest me?”
The stranger looks at Suguru from above his stupid glasses. “I mean, I’m pretty sure it’s clear. Where’s the cursed object?”
“Cursed object? Are you insane? I came here ‘cause these occult members did a ritual to make even more demons appear!” he shouts.
“Demon? I should be the one calling you insane,” the guy laughs. “Those are curses, moron. You’re a dangerous curse user, so I gotta bring you in, by Jujutsu regulations.”
No, you’re definitely insane, Suguru thinks. What is he going on about? Jujutsu? Isn’t that a martial art?
“I’m not going to let myself arrested by a lunatic,” he says hotly. “I’m not- a curse user, or whatever you called it. These monsters are dangerous, and sometimes I can destroy them. They leave behind an essence.”
The guy raises one white eyebrow. “That’s exactly what being a curse user entails. If this is a ruse to pretend you’re just an innocent high-schooler, it’s not gonna work.”
“What? It’s not a ruse!” he looks at the guy incredulously. “And who are you to say innocent high-schooler? You can’t be any older than me!”
“I can say that,” he says dismissively, “because I am in college. Technically. Anyways, if you keep resisting, I’m going to have to use force. But if I do, Fushiguro will probably scold me, for using jujutsu against supposed civilians.”
Fushiguro? Who’s that? Is this kid going to attack him?
“You can try,” Suguru says, calling up several of the demons he’s caught.
“Oh? Finally ready to drop the act?” the guy smiles widely, taking his hands out of his pockets. Suguru can sense a pressure starting to emanate off of him too. Does this kid have the same ability as him?
He readies one of the demons to shoot off in the guy’s direction, but before it can even start to move, he’s already in front of Suguru, bright eyes glinting as he holds up a hand full of- something to fling at his face.
Before it can come in contact, though, Suguru throws his head back, and sweeps out a leg a second after regaining his balance. The guy dodges narrowly, but the edge of his toe catches against the guy’s ankle, making him stumble a step. It’s only for a moment, but for Suguru, that’s all he needs.
A demon in the form of a viper lashes out from his collar, hidden for this very purpose. It latches onto the guy’s hand, thrown out to keep his balance, fangs pulsing.
“Got you.” Suguru grins.
The boy’s face contorts, glasses slipping off his head, but then it smooths out, and he smiles right back.
“You’re not bad,” he laughs. “But you’re making a mistake, using a curse as weak as this to try and beat me.”
The viper vaporizes into nothing a second after.
The pressure coming from the guy’s body suddenly increases, choking him with its nearness. When he raises his hand, there’s a faint light emanating off of it, and when he raises it, Suguru can immediately tell he’ll die, or at the very least be very injured if he takes it full on.
“Limitless Curse Technique,” the guy breathes out, eyes squinting in concentration. “Azure-”
“Alright, that’s enough, both of you!”
Suguru whips his head around to see a man in all black, smiling with a plastic bag hanging off of his arm.
“Itadori-san!”
“Yo, Satoru,” the man waves his hand in greeting. “By the way, it’s Itadori-sensei, now. School year starts in just a couple weeks, after all.”
“Sure,” the guy- Satoru? Says easily, dusting himself off. “I was just dealing with a curse user trying to get his hands on the cursed object.”
“Well, that’s bad,” Itadori says. “Care to hand it over?”
“Cursed object? What the hell are you talking about?”
Itadori blinks. Then, a mouth opens on the side of his face.
“He means the finger you picked up, brat,” the mouth drawls.
Suguru goes ridged.
What the fuck is that?
Then, again, this time out loud. “What the fuck is that?”
Itadori slaps a hand over it. “Sorry about that,” he says apologetically. “I thought I stopped him from doing that a while ago.”
Another mouth appears over the hand. “You were distracted, so I took advantage of it. Let your guard down more, and I’ll take over, brat.”
“That’s never happening,” Itadori sighs. “Anyways, the finger? I kind of need it right now.”
Suguru shakes his head. “I’m not giving this- cursed object or whatever it is to crazy people. I’m going to the police.”
He turns away, intending to jump off the roof and have a demon catch him, but before he can even take a step, Itadori is front of him, holding onto his shoulder.
“Nah, sorry. Can’t let you do that,” he hums. “If you’re really a curse user like Satoru says, I’ll have to take you and the finger to the school.”
“Get,” Suguru says slowly, “Your hand off me.”
“If you come with us and we can confirm you aren’t here for a bounty, then you’ll be safe. It’s fine.”
No way these lunatics are just going to let him go, after what the white haired kid had just been about to do. He’s going to get out of here as soon as possible.
Discreetly sliding his hand down to his back pocket, he holds his hand up, summoning the strongest demon in his arsenal. That should be enough to get him out of the place, even if he has to sacrifice it.
He can already feel the pressure building in his chest, trying to rip its way out.
Itadori’s eyes widen, as if he senses what’s about to be released, but it’s too late by then. The demon is already out, roaring its anger.
“Stop them!” Suguru shouts.
The beast swipes out its claws, raking deep marks in the spot where Itadori was standing. That probably won’t kill him. He thinks. After all, if the Satoru guy called the man sensei, then he has to be strong, right?
The dust clouds settle, and there’s no mangled body in the ruined cement, he notes with relief. Although, if Itadori isn’t there, then where is he?
Suguru looks around wildly, before spotting a flash of pink amongst the rubble, which is- holy shit, is that guy levitating the chunks of cement?
Itadori is handing the plastic bag off to the white haired kid, saying, “It’s kikufuku, from Sendai. Fushiguro said you like it, yeah?”
He completely has his back turned to the raging demon, he realizes. The idiot’s going to die. Maybe he should call it off, but at this point, reigning it in will take too much energy and he’s already exhausted as he is now, having absorbed the essence of four demons already.
The demon rears back on its twisted legs, screaming deafeningly loud before starting to charge, bladed arms swiping.
It seems that Satoru has seen it too, eyes widening.
“Sensei, behind-!”
It crashes down with a boom, and Suguru is already sprinting to it, preparing to bring it back in. He’s not about to murder some dumb guy just to escape. He’s not desperate enough to let him die.
Before he can get his hand out to the demon, though, he sees something that stops him in his tracks.
Itadori is blocking the demon’s blades with just his hands. Even though the razor sharp edges are pressing into his palms hard enough to slice completely through, he’s holding them up with what looks to be no effort.
“That’s dangerous,” he frowns. “Is that your technique? Releasing cursed spirits?”
The demon screams again, digging its claws into the ground, but Itadori doesn’t budge.
“No,” Suguru says carefully. “It’s- once I kill them, I can absorb their- remaining soul? Or essence, and once I do I can control them, and bring them out at will.”
“Whoa!” Itadori’s eyes widen. “That’s- any cursed spirit, you say? Even special-grade?”
“I don’t know what that means, but probably,” Suguru says, tilting his head to the side. “I’ve never encountered a demon- curse that doesn’t leave behind something I can absorb. It only works if I do it, though.”
Itadori laughs, as if there isn’t a giant curse struggling against his hands.
“With a technique like that, I’d say you qualify to be Grade One at the very least, or maybe even special-grade, like Satoru here!” he nods his head behind, to the kid, now crouching with a disgruntled expression.
“Sensei, that sucks,” Satoru whines. “I’m supposed to be the only special-grade student, here. My whole existence is impossible! It’s what makes life interesting.”
“Don’t be like that. You’ll have another classmate, after all,” Itadori smiles. “So, how about it? I’m going to have to take you to Jujutsu Tech either way, to get registered. I promise I won’t let any harm befall you.”
What are they talking about? Special-grade? Why does that keep coming up? This whole situation has spiraled out of control too fast for Suguru to notice. If he truly doesn’t have a choice in coming, he’d rather be escorted than kidnapped. Itadori is too strong for him to escape, evident from the way he’s blocking the curse.
Carefully, he takes the mummified finger out of his pocket, cringing at the dry texture.
“Okay,” he says, holding it out. “I’ll come, but I’m going back right after I get registered at Jujutsu-”
He’s cut off by the booming roar of the cursed spirit. It jumps back from Itadori before the man can grab it properly, and charges at Suguru, instead.
“Hey!” Satoru shouts. “Watch out!”
He’s frozen for a second before the shock wears off, and he starts running out of the curse’s path. None of the curses he’s ingested have ever done this, he thinks, thoughts running a mile a minute. Are they turning against him? Or is it just this one?
The curse is following him. If he can’t control it anymore, then he’s dead. The fact that he’d been able to defeat it in the first place was a miracle in itself; he can’t do it again unless under the same circumstances.
Even running as fast as he can, he knows he can’t dodge if the curse tries a full on lunge again. Which it looks to be gearing up to do, he realizes, fear curling in his gut. He doesn’t have time to bring out any other substantial curses to protect himself.
As it starts sprinting to him, blade-arms slashing at the air, Suguru thinks, This is a shitty way to die.
An instant before the edge reaches him, a voice rings out from above the curse, resonating in the air.
“Cleave!”
The curse drops immediately, blade falling inches from his feet.
Backing away, he sees green fluid leaking out from the fallen curse. Belatedly, he realizes that whatever Itadori did, sliced it into countless chunks of flesh.
“Man, sorry about that,” he says, coming down and rubbing the back of his head. “I thought you’d reign it in, but then it was out of control so I was almost too late there.”
Wordlessly, Suguru holds out the finger, edging away from the pooling blood.
Itadori brightens. “Thanks. That was probably what was making the curse go berserk, there. Sukuna’s fingers are pretty powerful.”
Then, to Suguru’s horror, he tips his head back and drops the finger into his open mouth, swallowing it whole.
He makes a face, then laughs. “I’ll never get used to how disgusting it is. It’s been a while since I’ve seen one of these. Now there’s just what, three left?”
“Why did you do that?” Suguru asks.
“Huh? Itadori turns his head to him. “Oh, that must look pretty strange, huh?”
An understatement, he thinks.
“Itadori-sensei is the host to the King of Curses, Ryomen Sukuna,” Satoru cuts in, standing back and opening the plastic bag. “There are three of the cursed fingers out of twenty total in Japan, and they need to all be ingested by him. They’re special grade cursed objects.”
That kind of makes sense, in a fucked up way. After all, it isn’t the weirdest thing he’s heard today.
“Okay! Now that that’s settled, how about we head to your house?” Itadori claps his hands together.
“What?” Suguru blinks at him.
“Your parents,” the man says again. “Don’t you need to explain to them what you were doing out so late? We’re going to Tokyo, so we gotta let ‘em know.”
“Oh. Sure. I’ll go talk to them.”
“Ah, wait, hold on. I’ll help explain,” Itadori says. “Say it’s a school trip, and you were doing club stuff. Don’t I look like a trustworthy teacher?”
“You look like a stalker,” Satoru snorts. “All black and with a kid at night? They’ll call the police on you.”
“I do not look like a stalker!” Itadori says, affronted. “This is a normal outfit, and you’re wearing the same-”
“Okay,” Suguru cuts him off. He looks like nothing like the man who just destroyed a powerful curse a minute ago. “You can come to my house. Don’t do anything weird to make my parents suspicious.”
“Nice! Lead the way.”
“I’ll say I convinced you to do it, ‘cause I’m a delinquent!”
x