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Part 2 of Nothing Stays (Lesion-verse), Part 4 of With This Treasure, I Summon Emotional Turmoil (Fushiguro & Zenin), Part 25 of Until I Know (JJK) , Part 13 of The World Looks Different (Yuuji AU of AUs) , Part 15 of The Narrow Road (Yuuji)
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2026-04-18
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How to Make a Difference and Die (and then Un-Die) Trying

Summary:

Yuuji settles into Jujutsu society just about as well as the first time he did with Sukuji. Sukuna makes things a little more difficult this time around, but Yuuji is simply too blown away by the fact that his parasite has somehow retained memories of a future (a past—a life he has already lived and left behind) to find merit in hiding him away.

“You are so stupid,” Sukuna says every morning, and Yuuji is overwhelmed by images of his own two hands, one bleeding and one impure in action, as they suffocate the final hope within Fushiguro’s eyes.

Notes:

TWLD Yuuji + Lesion Megumi meet :D

For Yellow_Jello who said they wanted to see this happen after I mentioned it in an author’s note in WASBAL!! <3

This takes place before Megumi skips ahead to Shibuya in chapter 6 btw (and then it links up to ch5 and ch6) (you’ll see what I mean) (if you haven’t read When a Scratch Becomes a Lesion, this might be a bit confusing) (if you have read When a Scratch Becomes a Lesion, this might still be a bit confusing)! Chapters 8 and 9 of WASBAL (which, at the time of writing this, have not actually come out or been completed yet lol) would create such a dramatic timeline shift that placing this AU in the same universe that follows through the entirety of Megumi’s story wouldn’t… work. lol ^^!

 

If anything in this one-shot doesn’t make sense... yes it does 🫶 or you do not see it 🌀oooooh
(This is a very crack-fic-flavored one-shot, so... it's gonna be confusing and funny and have weird pacing, but I hope y'all like it! Maybe I'll rework this idea on a rainy day.)

Edit: OH BY THE WAY! This is a part of my The World Looks Different series (in which Yuuji transmigrates/isekais every time he dies) and an AU of my Nothing Stays series (focused on When a Scratch Becomes a Lesion, in which Megumi has some wibbly-wobbly time fun) ^^!

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

When Yuuji wakes up, he does so with all of the breath gone from his lungs. He is suddenly upon that dreaded rooftop once again, and Megumi is staring at him like he is a monster given human skin.

 

“You are no longer human!”

 

No, he thinks, no, no, no. Not this again. I’ve lived this moment so many times it isn’t even funny anymore, but this time feels different–it feels like apprehension is in the air and there’s not one single thing I can do about it. It feels like–

 

“–a curse!”

 

It feels like–

 

“–under Jujutsu regulation–”

 

It feels like Sukuna wouldn’t mind tearing all of the fingers off of his own hands. He feels more hostile than any trapped-within-him version of the King of Curses ever has, and all Yuuji can do is laugh into his hands at the idea of being pieced together with a worst-case scenario once again.

 

Megumi scoffs out a laugh of his own at the sight of his unrestricted contortion, his eyebrows furrowing like they always do when he thinks too hard. “What is wrong with you?”

 

Yuuji presses the heels of his palms into his cheekbones and screeches out a laugh more like a hawk’s final cry than the verbal disbelief of a boy simply finished with the persistently wretched spiral that has become of his pitiful existence. “We don’t have time to get into all of that,” he says, pulling his hands down his face until they rest weightily around his own neck.

 

“Right you are!” Gojo Satoru, the man of the hour, proclaims boisterously as he appears out of nowhere in particular. Yuuji drags his eyes to the sight of him slowly, as though impaired. There is no Kikusuian bag in sight.

 

“Gojo Satoru,” Megumi announces, rightfully surprised for the both of them. “What are you doing here?”

 

Gojo waves his hand while he grins. “Oh, you know,” he says, dragging out his words in that sing-songy way he loves to use. “I simply figured I’d pop on over and check on my wonderful student!”

 

Megumi scowls and tightens the grip he has on his own hand, Kuro and Shiro at the ready in his darkness. “How considerate of you,” he remarks dryly.

 

“So,” Gojo says cheerfully, “Did you manage to locate that certain cursed object, precious student?”

 

Megumi nods his chin towards Yuuji. “He ate it.”

 

Yuuji barks out a laugh again, but the pressure on his windpipe makes the sound come out like more of a garble than a chortle. “Right,” he agrees assuredly, his voice strained.

 

Gojo furrows his brows beneath his blindfold before approaching the boy. “Hey, so… choking yourself isn’t the most courteous greeting to give someone you just met, just so you know.”

 

Yuuji rolls his eyes and his head lolls with the motion. His legs feel weak. His knees are shaking. “S’kuna’s chokin’ me,” he says.

 

“Oh,” Gojo breathes out. “Can you–?”

 

“No,” Yuuji says. “Don’t ev’n both’r.”

 

“Oh,” Gojo says again. He approaches Yuuji and raises his hand, sliding his finger in the air until it nearly touches the boy’s forehead.

 

Yuuji leans towards it.

 

Megumi says something from behind Gojo, but the world is too bright, too dark, too loud, too quiet, too painful, too pleasurable, too immeasurable, too frantic, too-quickly spinning, too sluggish, too relaxed, too colorful, too dull, too much, too little, too everything—

 

“I’ll see what I can do.”



Everything fades to black.

 

………

 

Yuuji settles into Jujutsu society just about as well as the first time he did with Sukuji. Sukuna makes things a little more difficult this time around, but Yuuji is simply too blown away by the fact that his parasite has somehow retained memories of a future (a past—a life he has already lived and left behind) to find merit in hiding him away.

 

“You are so stupid,” Sukuna says every morning, and Yuuji is overwhelmed by images of his own two hands, one bleeding and one impure in action, as they suffocate the final hope within Fushiguro’s eyes.

 

—just swallow, that’s all you can do, you stupid, useless boy, just eat it and die already—

 

And the first-person view of a sin he has already performed and been forgiven for and repented for and re-lived to see time and time again flashing before his eyes is a flashbang of terror in the redness of the rising sun.

 

Yuuji lies in his bed simply breathing most mornings because simply lying and breathing is all that he is good for. 

 

Recently, they visited the Eishu Detention Center for the bajillionth time. Except, this time, Gojo-sensei joined them, and he joined them because Megumi—who is his son, apparently—asked him to. The whole experience left Yuuji reeling. If Megumi—and he has insisted that Yuuji call him that now, instead of Fushiguro, and how amazing is that, truly—had the guts to ask for help when he needed it in every universe Yuuji has visited and died in, his life would probably have been a whole lot easier.

 

…Not that Yuuji himself doesn’t play a major role in the suffocation he experiences every time he transmigrates, but Megumi is a runner-up for “the best at sucking at life” just behind him. It is a sad and stupid race he feels no accomplishment in running.

 

By the time Sukuna peels his images of pity and horror from the backs of Yuuji’s eyelids, the boy is hungry enough to scrounge around in the back of the fridge for something that sounds half-good and looks half-edible. Yuuji removes himself from his bed with mammoth effort, stepping his bare feet onto the wooden paneling of the boy’s dorms.

 

He makes it two steps down the hallway before Sukuna decides that one bout of visual-mental torture is not enough for today.

 

He makes it two steps into the kitchen before Kugisaki—Nobara, actually, because the girl had also, miraculously, requested to be called by her given name (how lucky is he?)—joins him.

 

He makes it two steps towards the table with a half-filled plate of fridge-dry rice and leftover ginger chicken meatballs before Iriei Shoko appears out of nowhere and announces that Megumi has woken up from his sleep.

 

Yuuji nearly drops his plate out of surprise. He sets the ceramic down onto the dining table a bit harsher than he’d meant to before sprinting towards the back door, Nobara hot on his heels the whole way.

 

He skids to a stop in front of Megumi and drops to his knees. His friend looks good. He looks tired, sure, and worn-out in total, but who wouldn’t be after everything he went through? Nue had saved him from the detention center’s second curse, sure, but he’d had to deal with the whole barrage on his own. Nobody was able to come to his rescue, and Yuuji, Nobara, and Gojo took long enough to find him that the threat had been neutralized before they even opened the right door.

 

Yuuji grabs his hand and very nearly drops it out of surprise. Why is his hand so bloomin’ “Cold—uh, I mean—I’m glad you’re looking better too, man, but—ow, geez—are you really okay? How we found you… uh.” He winces. “I mean, it could have been worse! Much worse. Thank God it wasn’t worse. But, uh… y’know.” He puts his other hand on the back of Megumi’s left one, grinning tensely. “It was scary, seeing you just… disappear like that.”

 

“It was,” Megumi agrees, looking away from him. “Sorry.”

 

“Sorry?” Yuuji repeats to himself. What the heck does he have to be sorry about!?

 

Yuuji sputters. “Megumi, no, you can’t just–just–” He groans before taking a deep breath and letting it go, furrowing his brows. “Megumi, you don’t have anything to be sorry about. I thought Gojo-sensei already told you that.”

 

“He did,” Megumi says.

 

Yuuji lets out a tense sigh. Wonderful, he thinks, so why are you still apologizing?

 

Megumi turns back towards him, and his eyes look more sure, more sturdy, than they have in quite a long while. “Did you know that dying to win and risking death to win are very different things?”

 

Are you— Yuuji’s lips curl as he furrows his brows. He is so stupid, he thinks harshly. That stupid—foolish—that—that idiot. Of course he would concern himself with the debate of achievement versus dying for a cause instead of taking care of his own stupid mental health. “Megumi– of course they are, but what–”

 

Nobara shoves Yuuji’s head down with both of her hands, scowling at Megumi’s blank expression the second pink hair goes from framing the top of his vision to not hardly being in it at all. Yuuji protests verbally, the sudden, forced change in posture forcing him to release Megumi’s hand.

 

“Nobara, come on,” he laments. “You cannot just—”

 

“Just did,” Nobara snarks. She points at Megumi, then. “You jerk! You idiot! You scared the crap outta—”

 

Yuuji zones out. He promises that he doesn’t mean to, and he double ultra promises that his friends’ words matter to him—they matter to him more than his own life does, which sounds like an overstatement, but it really isn’t.]

 

It’s just that, well…. A lot has been going on lately. To start, Sukuna has not finished his macabre movie of Shibuya and Shinjuku behind his eyelids, Megumi-monologue and subtitles included. And Nobara is pushing down really hard on his head, and Yuuji is used to having concussions and getting over them, but he’s sure that Sukuna depriving his brain of oxygen on the rooftop is something that he hasn’t fully, physiologically recovered from somehow, and he’s been having a hard time concentrating lately and all of his thoughts are fuzzy.

 

Nobara, as though hearing his laments through the contact she had with the top of his head, removes herself from his skull to sit on Megumi’s right side. Yuuji heaves a breath of relief and allows his friends’ conversation lull over him like an ocean tide he wants to reach out and tug towards him no matter how petrified he is of being pulled under.

 

But then something—something unbelievable, unexplainable, inexplicable, inconceivable, incredible, lovely happens. Megumi takes a leap of faith—in them, in himself, and in God altogether—and Yuuji has to hold his breath.

 

“I’m from the future,” his best friend mutters, and Yuuji’s hands start shaking.

 

Oh, no. This is awful. He hates that his first response is to mourn the loss of his own innocence when his best friend is trying on his shoes right in front of him. This should be a moment of hope and of joy, shouldn’t it? Solidarity is so difficult to come by, especially under his—their?—beyond peculiar, certainly science-fiction, barely-even-believable circumstances.

 

Yuuji feels his eyebrows raise in empathy before he can even take a breath. Megumi stares at him with a face full of perplexity—who wouldn’t? Dropping a bomb like that and expecting a sympathetic response is something akin to screaming “fire!” in a restaurant and expecting nobody to raise their head frantically—and Yuuji just feels like up and slithering away.

 

“How?” Yuuji asks him, his voice light even whilst his expression flounders, flipping from concern to understanding, back and forth like a bad bulb. “Or, why? I mean”—He lets out a laugh, hitting himself internally for the frantic spinning in his mind—“That’s crazy, Megumi! Cool, but crazy. And you’ve just been through something traumatic, so, like—ugh. I don’t mean I don’t believe you, but… maybe you just think you’re from the future? Sorry.”

 

When Megumi doesn’t respond right away, Yuji takes in a shaping breath. He says, his voice sounding small, “Have you told Gojo-sensei about any of this yet?”

 

“No,” Megumi replies, looking weary. He turns towards Yuuji, and his eyes are set like stone. “Do you think I should?”

 

Yuuji tilts his head towards him, grinning softly. His voice weaves concern with curiosity quite beautifully. “I bet you already know the answer to that.”

 

Megumi looks away from him, and Yuuji can’t blame him. He would loathe it if someone who knew nothing about his own situation decided to suddenly act like they knew what was best for him. He may be acting hypocritical now, preaching of hope and faith when he has fallen so many times already, but what is the point in grace without a place to hold it firmly, two cupped hands to pass it forward to?

 

“I’m from another dimension,” Yuuji says, just a little something to alleviate the tension in the situation, but all he gets in return is a pair of unamused glances.

 

“What?” he says offendedly, raising his hands in mock surrender. “It was just a joke.”

 

Megumi regards him suspiciously. “...You would never joke about something like that, especially after what I just claimed.”

 

He knows me too well. Yuuji grins sheepishly. “Sure I would,” he says unconvincingly.

 

“He’s right, you know,” Nobara says, and Yuuji feels like dying. She props her hands in fists against her waist and twists, leaning forward to peer at him without Megumi’s head between them. “You’re from another dimension.”

 

“Yeah,” he says, and Megumi hums.

 

“Wow,” Megumi says. “And here I was, thinking I was special.”

 

Yuuji punches his shoulder lightly. “Dude!”

 

Megumi grins tiredly.

 

………

 

Everything goes okay for a while, and by a while, he means maybe-like-twenty-minutes-give-or-take. Megumi says he’ll tell them about the future and Yuuji agrees to “lament all his struggles, Nobara, that would be too traumatic”. They all get comfortable in Megumi’s dorm room—Nobara on the bed, Megumi at his desk, and Yuuji in his beanbag—and then Megumi’s eyes go steely.

 

“What are you doing in my room?” he asks them, his voice harsh, and it suddenly feels like the world is twenty steps closer to cracking down the center.

 

Yuuji presses his palm into the freckled texture of the beanbag and laughs sheepishly. “You were about to tell us about the future that you’ve lived through,” he says.

 

Megumi looks at him like he’s the craziest person on Earth. “What are you talking about?” he asks pointedly. He turns towards Nobara. “Get off my bed, Kugisaki; what is wrong with you?”

 

Kugisaki hops off of his mattress with a scoff. She stands in the middle of his room and takes up all of the mental stability for herself for a moment to cross her arms and dot her T’s. “You were the one who told us that you’re from the future.”

 

Fushiguro furrows his brows like he was born to wear a grimace forever. “I never said anything like that,” he says. “Stop lying.”

 

Maybe this means that everything has gone back to “normal”. Maybe all that was wrong with the world has become right again. Or, maybe, something so inherently special has shifted in Megumi that they are the only ones left to bear the consequences.

 

Fushiguro and Kugisaki keep arguing. All that he can do is sigh.

 

Yuuji just hopes that, when all of this blows over, nobody will be interrogating him about the other lives he’s lived either.

 

………

 

Nothing changes for a while. Fushiguro remains his regular, prickly self. “Don’t call me that,” he says when Yuuji calls him by his name. 

 

“We don’t know each other like that, Itadori.”

 

“Right. Sorry.”

 

Kugisaki goes back to not caring about most of what they have to say.

 

They all join Nanami while he examines a movie theater at least four towns away and Yuuji learns that his body can’t keep up with all of his recalled jujutsu knowledge like it is able to in other lives. It is a very peculiar thing to relearn all that he knows but his body is unable to remember. It leads to much frustration and many taunts from the King of Idiot Remarks and Impossible Ideals within him.

 

And then, one day, on the day—the day of destruction, the day of the harvest, the darkest of nights, the brightest of moons—Sukuna falls silent.

 

Fushiguro asks him why Yuuji doesn’t call him “Megumi” anymore, and Yuuji’s mouth goes dry.

 

What? He feels like crying. “You told me not to,” he says, and the darkness of panic which surrounds them on Shibuya Crossing is nearly enough to release the confused and frustrated tears which he hides.

 

“When in the world did I—”

 

“Fushiguro,” Nanami greets as he approaches them. “Good. When we were informed only Gojo was permitted to enter the barrier after already losing contact with you, I couldn’t help but think the worst.”

 

“Okay,” Megumi replies unsurely, looking perplexed, and Yuuji can definitely relate to that because honestly, what in the world is going on right now? “Well, as you can see, I’m fine.”

 

“Your cursed energy looks wrong,” Yuuji says, “Familiar, but wrong.” He squints. Very familiar, actually.

 

“It’s perfectly normal,” Megumi snaps, glaring at him immediately.

 

Yuuji nearly throws up his hands and lets it slide. “No, it isn’t,” he disagrees assuredly. “It looks like—It looks like mine. It looks like” Sukuna’s.

 

His eyes widen, and Megumi reflects the sentiment. “No,” Megumi says, “it doesn’t. My cursed energy is just as it always was and nothing weird is going on.”

 

Normally, Yuuji would believe him. But, normally, Sukuna would be showing him a bloody future right now, and there is no hand holding down Megumi’s tongue or shoving his severed, bloody finger down his throat. “You’re Sukuna’s vessel right now,” he says.

 

Megumi leans towards him slowly. “Let’s talk somewhere else, okay?”

 

Nanami and Ino watch them go.

 

Ino leans towards Nanami. “Should we follow them?”

 

“No,” Nanami replies easily. “We’ll head to Meiji Shrine Station with Mei Mei and Ui Ui and take down the veil there.”

 

Ino salutes, and there isn’t anything mocking about the gesture. “Right!”

 

………

 

Megumi slams Yuuji against the station wall with his arm. “How did you know about Sukuna?” he seethes through tightly grit teeth. “You aren’t supposed to know about any of this.”

 

Yuuji scoffs. “I know you’re a time-traveller,” he says matter-of-factly.

 

“How?” Megumi presses him against the wall harder.

 

“You told me,” Yuuji says, biting his tongue not to call him something unwarranted.

 

“You’re right,” Megumi says. “I did. And you remember.”

 

Yuuji rolls his eyes. “Of course I do. I’m not as forgetful as you make me out to be.”

 

“Maybe,” Megumi says, bobbing his head. “Or, maybe you’re a time-traveller too.”

 

Yuuji hums. “I’m not.”

 

Megumi scowls.

 

“I’m a dimension-traveller.”

 

The pressure on his chest lets up as Megumi backs away from him. “You are?” He blinks heavily, and Yuuji has a sneaking suspicion that Sukuna is whispering sweet poisons in his ears. “I thought you were joking about that!”

 

Yuuji inclines his chin, crossing his arms across his chest. “Oh, so you remember that too?” he inquires. “Interesting. I wonder where this sudden remembrance has come from.”

 

“What the heck’s sudden about it?” Megumi bites back. “I was about to tell you and Nobara about the future before Sukuna took—he, uh—took control and we got shot into the future.”

 

Yuuji regards him appraisingly. He isn’t lying… “You didn’t happen to die before time-travelling, did you?”

 

“What?” Megumi asks harshly, furrowing his eyebrows. “No. Of course not. That would be crazy.”

 

Yuuji almost laughs. Yeah, he thinks bitterly. Totally crazy.

 

“So, you just appeared in the future,” he asks it like a fact.

 

“Yes,” Megumi says quickly. “So, are we still going to prevent Gojo from getting sealed or is that against whatever agenda you’re stringin’?”

 

Yuuji scoffs. “Of course we’re going to save him.” He uncrosses his arms and pushes himself off of the wall with the grip of his sneaker. “Let’s go.”

 

Megumi chases after him.

 

The gore on the descending floors is a familiar sight and the two of them walk at a moderate pace until Yuuji feels a broken tie become unsevered.

 

Chousou.

 

He quickens his pace, and Megumi shouts indignantly behind him. Yuuji doesn’t care. His brother is just up ahead and he’s going to make him remember their brotherhood even if it kills him.

 

“Woah—Yuuji, hold on!” Megumi shouts, running to catch up to him.

 

Yuuji looks at him over his shoulder and huffs out a fond breath. He turns back around slowly, closing his eyes in a blink that could never end for all he cares.

 

And then he leaps down the stairwell. Piercing Blood greets the spot where his head used to be. Yuuji reopens his eyes to the sight of his eldest brother’s concentrated expression honed in on him from several yards away.

 

Utilizing his inherent physical prowess, Yuuji runs towards Chousou, dodging and ducking and weaving around the streams of blood that careen towards him.

 

He keeps running until he’s nearly close enough to reach out and touch the Death Painting. From this proximity, he can just barely see the hardly-bridled fury within his blood-soaked eyes. It seems that finding no ultimatum in a pursuit to salvage the remnants of his older brothers has left an angry stain on the inside of Chousou’s psyche.

 

“Sukuna’s vessel,” the Death Painting greets with bloodthirsty eyes.

 

“Elder brother,” Yuuji tries.

 

He gets a Supernova to the back for his trouble. The blast shoots him straight into Chousou’s blood-soaked fist, the bludgeon shooting spikes of blood and viscera into his abdomen indiscriminately.

 

“Yuuji!” Megumi yells from the stairwell where he stands, shaking and unsure of himself.

 

Yuuji tilts his head backwards to regard him momentarily. The sentiment ends with blood spurting out from between his lips from the harsh tearing out of the impailments within him.

 

“You killed my brothers,” Chouosu says, his voice thick with emotion. “You killed them. So now, I will kill you.”

 

Yuuji turns towards his brother slowly, staggering without the stability of Flowing Scale to hold him in place. He bends over helplessly as his insides spill out of him, one arm around his middle like a hapless gauze.

 

His other arm reaches up, his hand making contact with the side of Chousou’s face tenderly, gingerly, like a murderer deserves to feel the comfort of his brother’s skin touching his own. Hot blood smears onto the Death Painting’s face. “I don’t blame you, brother,” he says, his breathing heavy, his lungs crackling, his voice soupy. “I would want to kill me too.”

 

………

 

Megumi watches Yuuji crumple to the ground after painting the curse user’s face with blood with eyes wider than saucers.

 

He just died, Megumi thinks, his hands trembling terribly. He just died. Yuuji just—and he—what… the heck just happened?

 

The curse user raises his hands up towards his head slowly. Megumi watches in subjective horror as he spins and stumbles nondirectionally, pulling at his hair and whispering incoherently. He trips over Yuuji’s dead, outstretched hand, choking back a scream or a cry and groaning woefully instead.

 

Megumi breathes in deeply before blowing out the air and clenching his fists. The curse user staggers further towards the depths of the station and Megumi takes the chance for all it’s worth. He half-crouches, half-runs towards Yuuji’s stone-still form and all of the blood pooling all around him with even breaths and as silently as he can.

 

The curse user disappears down the next stairwell just as Megumi reaches out towards Yuuji’s peace-laden face.

 

“Oh, no,” he mutters in disbelief, his hands trembling again now that they are no longer in fists.

 

“Oh, no,” Sukuna echoes from the back of his hand, his voice mocking. “The poor little vessel has fallen so dutifully. Boo-hoo.”

 

“Shut up,” Megumi grits, slapping the back of his hand. “Shut up.”

 

Sukuna laughs in the back of his skull. Megumi stares at Yuuji’s still face until the echoing madness fades from his mind.

 

What am I going to do? he wonders mournfully. Gojo’s going to get sealed and Yuuji is dead and he isn’t coming back because Sukuna is the one who healed him last time and Yuuji is such a fool for eating that dang finger in the dang first place and I should have stopped him—called it poison and meant it—or something. I should have helped him, I should have saved him! How the heck am I supposed to help anybody get through the life that I ruined for them if I can’t even save him?! What’s the point in trying if–

 

Yuuji sits up suddenly, his forehead crashing into Megumi’s as he gasps in a breath of bloody air through stale lungs.

 

Megumi careens backwards, slapping his forehead with both hands. “Ow! Yuuji, what the—” His lungs force what breath is left there out of him. “Yuuji!”

 

“Oh,” Yuuji says, barely nearly laughing at the irony. “Hey, Megumi. I’m back.” He grins. “Oppappi.”

 

“I will hit you—Don’t just joke around like that!” Megumi balls his hand into a fist and hits Yuuji’s leg.

 

“Ow!” Yuuji exclaims dramatically. He curls his lip. “I just died, dude! Ease up on the Yuuji-abuse!”

 

Megumi sighs heavily and sags forward. “Sorry,” he mumbles.

 

Yuuji sighs as he rolls his shoulders. He glances down at his abdomen and hums, considering. “So, did you heal me, or…?”

 

“No,” Megumi says plainly, matching gazes with Yuuji. Wow. That is… really gory. I didn’t know intestines could be that dark. “I can’t do that.”

 

Yuuji raises his hand up towards his face and hums when it glows green. “Oh. Must’ve been me.”

 

Megumi scowls. “Why didn’t you use that before you died?”

 

“I think I just re-learned it.”

 

“Oh.”

 

Yuuji stretches above his head, groaning in satisfaction at the motion. “Well!” he exclaims, slapping his hands on his thighs. “Let’s go save Gojo Satoru.”

 

Megumi slouches over. “Okay…”

 

………

 

“Yo! Satoru!”

 

“Yuuji, why haven’t we approached them yet?” Megumi asks him, peering around a concrete post on the station platform with furrowed brows. “He’s gonna seal Gojo.”

 

Yuuji, standing beside him and watching the scene before them from the other edge of the post, makes a noncommittal noise. “Wait here a second.”

 

“Okay…” Megumi whips towards him. “Wait, what—”

 

Yuuji shoots forward and kicks Gojo Satoru. He kicks Gojo Satoru right on the arm at his side and sends him slamming against the station wall. Yuuji cringes. “Sorry, bad pass!”

 

Kenjaku, wearing the skin of Getou Suguru, stands before him and his expression speaks volumes. He is confused, perplexed, puzzled, confused, and astounded all at once. That’s a lot of adjectives. He’s so confused it’s even listed twice.

 

“You have impeccable timing,” Kenjaku says.

 

Yuuji, still facing the direction he kicked Gojo in, waves towards him dismissively. “Yeah, yeah,” he says. “Do your monologue, Brainiac. I’ve got better places to be.”

 

“Well,” Kenjaku says, lowering his arm slowly. Yuuji turns to watch the motion and—Oh, was he holding the Prison Realm this whole time? That’s hilarious—Kenjaku only smiles. “I’m afraid my preferred audience is currently incapacitated.”

 

Yuuji hums, somewhat disinterested as he turns to face the ancient sorcerer. “You don’t say,” he says. “Well, I suppose there’s only one thing left for me to do now.”

 

Kenjaku smiles pleasantly. “And what would that be?”

 

Yuuji smiles right back, equally as pleasantly. “Would you prefer to be…” He snaps his fingers and a small flame ignites at his nails. Oh, sweet. I guess I did just transmigrate back here somehow…? ‘Must’ve gotten my full catalogue back. “Charred or minced?”

 

Kenjaku’s grin goes strained. “I don’t suppose you have a third option for me.”

 

“Oh, sure I do,” Yuuji says. He turns towards Megumi’s hiding spot. “Frog available?”

 

Megumi nods.

 

Yuuji turns back towards Kenjaku, still smiling. “I’ll rephrase: Charred, minced, or eaten?”

 

Kenjaku breathes out a breath of disbelief. “Oh.”

 

Yuuji grits his teeth, sucking in a breath through them. “Ooh, I’m sorry,” he says condescendingly. “‘Oh’ was not an acceptable answer.”

 

He snaps and Kenjaku breaks into a million little, perfectly even cubes. “I don’t much enjoy the smell of burnt flesh,” Yuuji admits morbidly, shrugging. “I’m pleased he didn’t choose that option.”

 

Megumi shudders from behind the post. Who the heck is this guy?

 

Sukuna says, his voice blatantly intrigued, “Surely something interesting.”