Chapter Text
Curses do not need to sleep. Curse energy running through their bodies and sustaining them.
Obito found that he liked to rest anyways. Closing his eyes and pretending that he could drift asleep despite his body being wholly awake. He liked to duck into empty apartments and lay there, pretending that he was Uchiha Obito of Konoha. Stuck in a cramped apartment because his clan hadn’t wanted him, he remembered being frustrated about it. Angry and tearful and just “why, why, why”.
It had been the worst point in his life, he had thought. Young and naive as he grew tearful and wiped angrily at his tears. Promising to himself that things would only look up from here.
And then Kanabi came, then Rin, then the end of the world.
Obito’s life was a series of mistakes. Never good enough, fast enough, strong enough to do the right thing until the last moment where he threw his life away so that someone else- someone whose life wasn’t a series of failures- could live. He wanted to make something of his life, even at the footnote of it. Make sure that at least he did one thing right.
(Kakashi had looked at him with guilt and regret and so much grief. He didn’t deserve it. Not when he threw Kakashi’s life into chaos alongside his. Killing the last two people to anchor them to life.
For a genius, Kakashi was an idiot sometimes, he had thought wryly. His form crumbling into dust.)
The task of murdering, or he supposed it was “exorcising” now, curses was an idle one. Obito felt himself getting stronger with each curse he exorcised. His body acclimated to the new energy inside it at record speed.
The thing about being a past mass murderer, Obito had decided, was that it was pretty easy to build up curse energy thinking about all the things you did. Guilt made for a wonderful fuel and so did anger. Both emotions Obito was practically married to. Learned how to keep under layers and layers of lock and chain. (Maybe the marriage comparison was really bad when he put it like that.)
He supposed shinobi were built for cursed energy. Having learned to restrain emotions their entire life and keep it that way. A steady flow of tranquility with a hint of murder lurking below.
It grew idle enough that Obito wasn’t so distracted anymore for everything to hit him at once.
The first time Obito acknowledged the purple robes on his body it felt like death had drawn over him.
It felt so very heavy on his shoulders, a thousand and one ghosts weighing it down. It was new and whole now, but in his mind’s eye he could still see the ripped sleeve, the charred edges, the hole where his heart should be, burnt by lightning. It all weighed him down. Obito was left breathless for a moment. Feeling ghosts clutch at his arms and scream, whispering into his ears of why, why, why.
Why did he murder them all?
He felt a phantom hand shoved through his chest. The sound of lightning being all that he could hear for that one moment in time. Could see the expression of the phantom, pained (Kakashi, you sentimental fool). Could hear the kunai drop to the ground, the sharpest sound he’d hear before he stumbled back, see Kakashi’s hand shake in barely noticeable tremors. He had gurgled out blood, smiled victoriously and- (Kakashi, I’ll make a world where you won’t see me or Rin when the lightning roar, riding on your hand- why can’t you see? I’ll make you see-)
It had hurt, he remembered. Even if he didn’t die, even if that was his plan.
He remembered a slash on his neck, Minato looking down at his murderer and student. Obito had wondered what his teacher thought. The horror that must’ve come with the revelation that the man that caused Naruto to grow up alone and hated, the one that brought so many deaths to Konoha was his student. He wondered if Minato was angry, if he felt vindicated, or if he felt regret.
He felt the slight bump of a raised surface on his skin as he traced where his teacher’s Hiraishin kunai had made contact with his neck. Marked him for life alongside the Hiraishin seal on his back.
His body was an amalgamation of his past. A series of failures and consequences.
But Obito will be damned if he wore the Akatsuki robes. The redness of the inner coat seem to mock him with its vibrancy. The red clouds emblazoned on the front and center searing into his eyes and reminding him of a red moon that he once sought for. He tossed it away into a random corner of Kamui. Hope to never see it again and bury it along with everything else about his past.
His meeting with more jujutsu sorcerers came soon enough, inevitable with Obito’s habits to poke his nose where it doesn’t belong.
He felt it in the air. The feeling of a strong curse spiking, feeling like nature- His Kamui dropped him some kind of forest (Barriers on the outside. Which- what did that mean? What was being sealed in- or was something sealed out?). Reminding him of Konoha and its surrounding trees. He was familiar with navigating the terrain. All Konoha shinobis were. Finding their way through forests and camoflaughing amongst it was their signature. Using the forest as grounds for an ambush and assault.
He found that it was familiar to step on the branches of the tree. He tested his footing, finding it solid enough. God knows how many team exercises he’d done on top of these things, how many fights he’d fought using it as cover, how familiar it was and how it sung with half of his body. Itching for him to make it grow.
He wasn’t as nearly good as Hashirama, would only ever be half of what the man had been when he was alive. But half of Hashirama was leagues better than most shinobi could claim to be.
God of shinobi, the man was called.
(Madara felt bitter about that name. Built on the corpses of Uchiha clansmen and Madara himself. It wasn’t like Madara could talk on that front, though. Having as much, if not more, of a hand in ending the Uchiha legacy.
The man, sometimes, rarely, on nights where he was a bit senile if Obito were to be frank, was somewhat proud of the name that Hashirama got. Prideful for his friend and enemy in a way that Obito understood somewhat between him and Kakashi. Madara was… more, though, in every way.
It tends to come with the territory after that many years of being stuck, old and alone. Stuck with nothing but the memories and the scar on his back from Hashirama’s intended fatal blow. What was once a treasured friendship turned deadly was no doubt something that Madara never worked through in a healthy manner and it showed.)
And there, he felt. Wood sprouting out wildly on top of a building. Rushing at some jujutsu sorcerers he assumed. There was the pink haired boy again, Itadori alongside another one, shirtless and muscled.
(He hoped that it wasn’t another training maniac like Gai. The man was already infuriating as is being an adult from the brief glimpses he’d seen of the man with his green spandex, Obito cannot fathom another one of his teenage version.)
He observed the fight with his Sharingan. Feeling it pull on his curse energy at a steady rate as he tracked their movements and skills.
It was during his observation that he noted that Itadori had something inside of him. Vile and different from the boy’s own cursed energy. A different entity almost. Ancient and so, so strong.
His breath hitched inside his throat.
Jinchuuriki, he thought, almost giddy.
He saw their skills in a different light, then. With a “what if” thrumming inside him.
Kawarimi, he thought, looking at the sorcerer and his power. The sorcerer could swap objects around, specifically that of living beings- or cursed beings he assumed. It was still a common technique then, even if this place used cursed energy instead of chakra.
There was a reason why it was one of the three academy jutsus. It was terrifyingly effective when used in the right hands, Shisui had seen to that with the Shunshin. And now Obito could see it with the sorcerer. Clapping his hands at odd intervals to initiate a swap. With each clap came a hit against the cursed spirit. Even if claps didn't mean Kawarimi every time it was used.
Was that how it worked? To use your skill there was a need for a special activation mechanic? Did they not have standardized hand seals anymore?
Perhaps that was what Nanamin from before had used to unleash his chakra like that. But the man had simply explained his skill instead of clapping.
Obito wasn’t a genius like Kakashi or his teacher, but he had time to figure it out. The differences between these new powers.
The cursed spirit they fought against was strong as well. It used Mokuton, making something inside him itch to fight it. It moved with purpose and it analyzed the fight with intellect that the cursed spirits he exorcised lacked. It was an evolved version, he thought. Made up greater cursed energy.
How was the question, through time? Was Obito a special case being born with the amount of cursed energy he had?
So many questions, and so little answer. He moved with them as the cursed spirit and the muscle one left. He moved through the trees. Silent and practiced.
The fight continued. This time with a weapon that reeked of cursed energy.
Obito wondered even further. His mind trying to work on theories that he wasn’t nearly as well versed to do so. At least chakra was easy to understand, in its theory and application. Rather than whatever the hell was going on here.
The fight was dwindling down before Obito felt it. The trees around the sorcerers crumbling into dust as the cursed spirit absorbed it, gathering energy.
That wasn’t good. Obito should probably leave. Leave before a detonation went off and chaos descends.
But there were teenagers here. Their faces were round and young and even if they were sorcerers they were still teenagers. Their faces were so young. Maybe it would be hypocritical of him to care now. Only after the Jinchuurikis he'd sacrificed in the name of eternal peace even as guilt knawed away at his remaining conscience. They were teenagers when he drew the beast out of them and let them die. It was for the good of the world, he'd justify. Seeing their reanimated corpses on the battlefield and feeling bile at his throat that he was using them now, even in death. It was for the greater good, he'd thought. Becoming the shitty adult he'd once despised.
Fuck it, Obito decided. Hopping down from the trees using Kawarimi to replace himself with the pink one and slamming his hands down to the ground. Wood sprouting up, creaking and groaning in his ears. Hashirama’s cells burning with usage.
Eyes turned to look at him.
He felt a static in his mind for a moment before words reached him. Like a stray thought but that wasn’t his voice in his own mind.
Fuck, had he just been Yamanaka’d? Doubtful since he could still send wooden tendrils at his enemies. So he was still in control. So maybe this weird ass voice wasn’t a Yamanaka technique.
“You are one of us,” the voice noted. Oddly gentle. Perhaps a technique to communicate?
“Yeah, sure,” Obito agreed easily enough. Making more wood sprout from the ground. Twisted and ugly.
“You’re that cursed spirit,” the pink boy noted, eyes widening with recognition. Fists tensing defensively. Glancing between the two recognized threats.
“How do you have my power?” The thing was trying to regather its power after being interrupted, its attention focused on him. “Are you born of nature, too?”
The fuck was Obito a plant baby. He was born in a hospital to a very human mother, thank you very much.
“My birth is none of your business,” he snapped.
Then he felt it. A rippling of power and the barrier came collapsing. He snapped his eyes upwards.
There was a man there, white hair and haughty blue eyes. His instincts screamed at that this was it. That this was his enemy. That this man, arrogant expression and all, promised a fight to savor. That this man was strong and that his arrogance was warranted.
He must be a special existence, Obito noted. For Obito’s newly awakened curse instinct to just know.
Part of him wanted to flee under the man’s eyes- his eyes, they were unnatural, powerful, enemy- Obito squashed that part down quickly enough. He wouldn't flee, not yet.
The man seemed to flash away. The cursed spirit before him already attempting to escape and Obito knew that something was coming. Something bad.
His Sharingan whirled to life just as he felt a spark blaze into an inferno of cursed energy. Something crackled like lightning before him. Purple and furious as it charged at him.
Obito dropped into the Kamui dimension before he could be exorcised by lightning.
A special existence, Obito thought.
But that wasn’t the important part here, was it- the important thing here was-
Itadori, a Jinchuuriki. A monster trapped in a jar of flesh.
Something like excitement welled up inside him.
Something to hold onto and remind him of his previous life.
He knew he had to talk to the boy- he had to at least ask.
“Nanamin, didn’t you say that cursed spirit had intangibility?”
Kento, ignoring the nickname, affirmed. Through the phone, he can still hear the teasing tilt to Gojo’s voice.
Infuriating.
“What if, theoretically, it could use plants as well?” Gojo trailed off, almost consideringly. “Something like another cursed spirit.”
Kento tensed slightly, remembering the shock he’d felt as the newborn phased through his attack. How it reminded him of Gojo and what that could mean. After a few weeks of no news he'd assume the cursed spirit was exorcised and done with. Or at least hoped.
“And what if,” Gojo continued. “It used Todo’s technique, too?”
Kento paused for a moment. The implication was…dire, to say the least. He knew he should’ve skewered that cursed spirit right as it was born. Still new and weak and had not yet grown into its power.
And he had let it escape and now it had grown into a terror in the scant few weeks it was left to its own devices. Not yet metamorphosing into its adult form yet, but it would. Once it figured out how to expand its domain- if it hadn’t already. And it would be another blight for the jujustu world.
“A special grade curse that could replicate techniques,” he droned. Feeling the weight of the words heavy on his tongue.
He wondered what took place, what caused this cursed spirit to be born the way it was. What vile thought birthed this spirit, one so human shaped and yet felt so wrong.
It's technique- replication- something that would be another amidst a growing list of things to terrify the higher-ups with (Nanami is not looking forward to whoever has to report that another special grade has been born, most likely himself since he had discovered it. But maybe he can push this off to Gojo who deciphered its technique). Replication seemed highly plausible to explain how it grew so fast, picked up enhancing its movements with cursed energy after seeing its kin do so for its first few moments of life; so lost and yet already utilizing its abilities with the movements of a veteran.
It was a dangerous ability to be able to adapt and fill its arsenal with whatever it needed. Growing stronger with each encounter and using a sorcerer's technique against them. It was be demoralizing at the least and deadly at the worst, if the cursed spirit was able to switch out its abilities with no visible sign and intelligent enough to dissect how the technique worked and made it its own. Judging by the way it had hidden until now, when it was no longer vulnerable and lost, meant that it had such intelligence and patience. It was unlike the cursed spirit beneath the sewers. Lacking the childishness the other had and making up in elusiveness.
Its elusiveness had only come to an end when it realized it had an opportunity, a chance to test its abilities. Finally, now that it was stronger.
To test whether it could replicate jujustu technique used by sorcerers as it would its own brethren. And it had succeeded. With the little time it had to observe Todo.
It hadn’t caused any major incidents yet. But it will.
“I wonder when it had the chance to replicate intangibility,” Gojo mused casually. A hint of something in his voice, intrigue perhaps. It wasn't every day a spirit with replication was born. “Wasn’t it just born?”
And that was the question, wasn’t it.
“You can report this to the higher-ups,” Kento said before hanging up the call, already hearing Gojo whine. His mind was whirling with the new cursed spirit.
He knew he should’ve tracked down that thing. Exorcised it when it was just born.
(Gojo's question had suggested that maybe it wasn't a newborn, Kento remembered its billowing purple robes and oddly shaped scars. Feeling archaic and human and terrible. And Kento couldn't help but wonder.)
The thought was weighed on his mind heavily and Kento felt a familiar headache building up.