Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The city didn’t breathe anymore. Shinjuku was a graveyard now, still smoldering from a war between titans. Tower skeletons leaned jagged against the dusk, cracked and gutted by energy too ancient and violent for the modern world to contain. The scars of Gojo’s Maximum Purple still glowed faintly on the far side of the battlefield, painting the fractured skyline in burnt violet streaks. Smoke drifted low, dragging with it the metallic stench of blood and scorched rebar. Dust hung thick in the air, slow to settle. Nothing moved but ash.

Yuji Itadori stood alone. Or what was left of him.

He hunched slightly, chest rising and falling, skin glazed with sweat. One eye was nearly swollen shut. His arm twitched, unsteady. The last few minutes blurred together; light, thunder, then silence. Everyone else was gone.

And Sukuna was still standing.

Across the crumbled expanse, the King of Curses walked without hurry. He didn’t limp. He didn’t bleed. His expression gave nothing away. He looked like someone finishing a tough spar, not what should have been the fight of his life. He stopped twenty meters from Yuji, and raised one hand, fingers slowly unfurling.

Yuji spoke first. “You think this ends with you standing over us?” His voice cracked on the us.

Sukuna didn’t stop walking. His eyes flicked toward him, lazy and amused. "You call this standing? You’re the last flicker of a fire no one cared to watch die."

Yuji spat, iron blooming across his tongue. “You’ve spent your life stepping on people. What happens when there’s no one left under your feet?”

Sukuna’s smile curved, almost gentle. “I’ll be laughing, brat. You’ll be just another smear beneath the silence. That’s how stories like yours end.”

Yuji didn’t move. Not yet. But cursed energy stirred around him, pulsing low and heavy beneath his skin.

Sukuna’s smile curved slightly. “Try it. I want to see what kind of coffin you built for yourself.”

Yuji closed his eyes. He reached inward into his memory. Into that place where space bent to will, and cursed energy moved like breath.

A sudden image flickered behind his eyelids, clearer than thought: Gojo’s voice, firm but patient, echoed from deep inside him. “This is ‘Domain Expansion.’ Cursed energy is used to construct an innate territory with technique that spans the surrounding area.” T he memory sharpened; Gojo stood in front of him, calm and grinning, even as chaos raged behind them. “One advantage is a status boost due to environmental factors. It’s like a buff in a video game.”

Then the moment twisted. Another memory rose, this one colder. Sukuna, inside his body, smiling as black stone and shrine pillars tore through the earth. That feeling wasn’t just cursed energy. It was domination. The world hadn’t resisted him. It had obeyed.

Yuji had hated that feeling.
But now, he needed it.
He pulled it open.

The air shattered.

For a split second, the world fractured. One half turned cold and metallic, echoing with the distant hum of a train station, his domain. The other writhed with shrine pillars, slick stone, and lidless eyes, Sukuna’s. The two spaces didn’t stand apart. They collided, tearing into each other like oil and flame.

Sukuna laughed, not mockingly but entertained. “Now we’re dancing.”

It lasted a heartbeat. Then Malevolent Shrine swallowed the train station whole. The tracks splintered. The steel groaned, warped, and folded in on itself like it had never existed.

Yuji dropped to one knee, coughing blood.

Above him, the shrine finished blooming.

The ground beneath him cracked open with hairline fractures that pulsed red. Not from heat, but from intent. Every stone in the shrine’s reach remembered how to die. Yuji could feel it pressing against the edges of his body, slipping through skin, hunting for fault lines in his soul.

He pushed back. Not just with strength. With refusal. With spite.

A flicker of cursed energy sparked around him. His hands shook as he shaped it. Not into an attack. Into a ward. A shell. A line he wasn’t ready to let them cross.

"Simple Domain." His voice was low, nearly a whisper. It snapped into place like a breath held too long.

Sukuna watched him with that same dispassionate interest. "Keep clawing," he said, voice edged with amusement. "The ones who fight hardest always break loudest.”

His hand moved, fingers flexing. The shrine responded.

Something sharp sliced through Yuji’s barrier, shearing into his left leg. He shouted as his foot tore free and hit the ground beside him. He dropped, jaw clenched hard, his teeth rattling from the impact.

"Bastard," he hissed. "That all you got?"

Sukuna tilted his head slightly, amused. "Closer than you deserve."

Blood poured out fast. For a second, his vision swam. But his fingers dug into the red, shaping the current. "Come on. Come on, hold."

The cursed energy surged through the fluid, binding vein to vein, muscle to bone. Blood Manipulation. It wasn’t elegant. It wasn’t clean. But it held.

Yuji dragged himself upright again, chest heaving. ‘I'm not done. Not yet.’

Sukuna raised his hand. This time, his voice rang clear.

"Open."

Yuji froze.

The air changed. Every particle hanging in the shrine—cursed dust, scorched ash, fragmented energy—caught flame in a single instant. Pressure dropped. The sky folded inward.
Divine Flame.

Yuji turned his head. There was a figure beyond the edge of the shrine, sprinting through the wreckage, cursed energy flaring wild and frantic.
Choso.

His mouth was moving. Shouting. One arm stretched toward him like he could still reach.

Yuji saw him and understood. He wasn’t going to make it.

Of course you came. You always do.’

But it was too late. His lips moved. The words were almost soundless.
"I'm sorry."

The light consumed everything.

There was no pain. Not at first.

There was nothing. No sound. No light. No shape. No body. Not even silence, because that meant something was left to hear.

Yuji didn’t feel dead. He didn’t feel anything. And that, more than the fire or the loss, was what terrified him. ‘Is this what’s left of me?’

He tried to move, but there was no “him” to move. No limbs. No breath. No gravity. Only thought, stretched thin across an empty place. If he could think, then something still existed. But it felt like it shouldn’t. 'Maybe this is the part where I disappear.’

Time didn’t pass. It frayed.

Then something shifted. Not heat. Not sound. Just a presence. It didn’t come closer. It didn’t speak. But it was there, watching from the edge of whatever remained.

Yuji reached for it. Or tried to. The thought of reaching fell apart before it could become anything.

Then a light cracked through. Not bright. Not hot. Just dim and steady. A ceiling came into focus, blurry and still. There was a hum. Something pressed against his back.

Wood. A chair.

And then he breathed.

His lungs filled. His body returned in pieces. Fingers. Arms. Legs. Weight. He felt the fabric on his skin. The ache deep in his ribs. The air against his face.

Yuji blinked. The room pulled itself into focus.

It wasn’t Shinjuku.
But it was somewhere he recognized.

The walls were covered in paper talismans, floor to ceiling. Cold fluorescent light buzzed above him. He sat in a simple chair, the kind that wasn’t meant to be comfortable. There was no window. No clock. No escape.

But he knew this place.
He remembered this moment.

A weight settled in his chest—not fear exactly. Something quieter. He didn’t know if he was breathing because he was alive, or because someone wanted him to think he was.

Across from him sat someone impossible.
Gojo Satoru.

He leaned in, elbows resting on his knees, face calm beneath his blindfold. That crooked smile was already there. He tilted his head slightly, like he was waiting for a punchline only he could hear.

“Mornin’. So… which version of you am I talking to now?”

Yuji didn’t answer. He just stared.

And remembered everything.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

The dorms at Jujutsu High hadn’t changed.
Long halls. Old wood. The kind of quiet that had nothing to do with peace.

Gojo’s sandals slapped lightly against the polished floors as he led the way, hands tucked in his sleeves like he was a monk and not the strongest sorcerer alive.

Yuji followed two steps behind. His own pace was silent. Eyes sharp. Not because of caution, but memory.

He’d walked this hallway before. Not today. Not even this year. But he remembered.

“I’m legally required to inform you that your new room may or may not be haunted,” Gojo said, gesturing lazily to the corridor ahead. “If you hear weeping, scratching, or inexplicable recorder music, just ignore it. That’s probably Panda.”

Yuji didn’t laugh.
Didn’t smile either.
But his gaze dipped just slightly.

Panda...

He remembered the last time. Shinjuku. The wreckage. The way Panda had looked, not broken, exactly. Just… too quiet. He didn’t let the thought linger.

“…That’s not a nickname, is it?” Yuji said flatly.

Gojo grinned. “You’ll see.”

Yuji said nothing more.

They turned a corner. Light filtered through paper windows along one side, illuminating the grain of the wood floor. Dust danced in the beams.

“You’ll be in the first-year wing,” Gojo continued, gesturing again. “It’s usually quiet this time of year. No upperclassmen throwing talismans in the showers or stealing the cursed rice crackers. We live like monks out here.”

He turned toward a sliding door near the end of the hall. “Here we are.”

He slid it open with theatrical flair. “Welcome to Casa Itadori!”

The room was simple. Tatami floors. A futon. Low shelf. One window.

Yuji stepped inside slowly.
It looked the same. Not just in structure, but in weight.
A memory from a life that hadn’t happened yet.

He didn’t move to touch anything.

Gojo flopped down onto the futon, hands behind his head. “Mmm. Yep. Still comfy. Still smells like despair and disinfectant.”

Yuji didn’t react. His eyes swept the walls. The corners.
Everything in him itched to check for traps, not physical ones. Emotional.

“You’ll have time to decorate later,” Gojo said. “Get some posters. Scare off the ghosts with Jennifer Lawrence.”

Yuji glanced over. Barely. “She’s retired.”

Gojo made a shocked gasp. “Say it ain’t so.”

The silence that followed wasn’t awkward, but lighter than before.

Gojo sat up, elbows on knees. His voice, when it came, was casual. “So, I mentioned training.”

Yuji didn’t answer.

“I wasn’t kidding,” Gojo said. “Technically, you’re a student now. But you don’t have to fight.” Gojo shrugged. “It’s not a prison. You could stay here. Learn theory. Eat snacks. Watch cursed documentaries with me.”

Yuji didn’t move.

“You’ve already been through a lot,” Gojo added. “More than most.”

“I’m fighting.”

Gojo’s lips twitched. “Didn’t even hesitate.”

Yuji turned slightly. “If I wanted safety, I’d have stayed dead.”

Gojo raised an eyebrow. “A little dramatic.”

Yuji looked at the door. “What happens when you’re not there next time?”

Gojo didn’t answer.

Yuji folded his arms. “Then I fight.”

And Gojo, after a moment, gave a crooked grin. “Man. You’re going to make the higher-ups sweat.”

A knock came at the door.

Gojo called, “Come in!”

Yuji didn’t turn right away when the door opened.

He felt it.
The presence.
Low and familiar. Quiet and sharp.

His body didn’t flinch, but something beneath the surface twisted like a string pulled taut.

That cursed energy…

He turned.

Megumi stood in the doorway, uniform crisp, arms lightly folded, one still bandaged. His posture was relaxed, but his gaze, dark, tired, searching, landed on Yuji like a hand to the chest.

Yuji stopped breathing.
It had been weeks. Or more.
It had been seconds.

Because the last time he saw Megumi…
…it wasn’t him. Not really.

He had stood in his own skin, yes—but with Sukuna curled behind his eyes, smiling with his mouth, bleeding with his hands.

That memory didn’t fade. Not with time. Not even with death.

Yuji’s throat tightened.

He blinked, and the flicker was gone. This wasn’t Sukuna. This was Megumi. His Megumi. Still standing. Still whole.

“You look like shit,” Megumi said dryly.

Yuji’s reply came just a beat late. Quiet. “Thanks.”

Gojo, who had been leaning half-out the door like a cat eavesdropping on drama, clapped once. “Beautiful. Real bonding. Warms the soul.”

He flashed a grin and disappeared down the hallway with a lazy wave. “I’ll give you two time to braid each other’s hair.”

The door clicked shut. The room stilled.

Yuji didn’t move. Megumi didn’t either. For a while, they just looked at each other.

Then:

“I didn’t think I’d see you again,” Megumi said, voice low.

Yuji’s breath caught. Not visibly. But he felt it.

“Yeah,” he murmured.

Megumi leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed. “They were vague about what happened. Gojo said you got control back, but…”

He hesitated.

Yuji’s hand clenched slowly at his knee.

“I remember what I saw,” Megumi added.

Yuji’s eyes lifted. “…Me, or him?”

“I saw you,” Megumi said. “Right at the end.”

Yuji let out a breath, just enough to release the knot behind his ribs. His shoulders didn’t drop. But something loosened.

“You’re still standing,” he said. “That’s what matters.”

Megumi’s brow ticked faintly. “And you’re not even dead.”

“I’m full of surprises.”

Megumi didn’t smile. Not exactly. But the corners of his mouth didn’t stay flat.

“You’re different,” he said. “The way you talk. Move.”

Yuji didn’t look away. His voice was quieter now. More careful.

“So are you.”

Megumi’s brow ticked. “Not like this.”

Yuji didn’t answer right away. Then, finally:

“It wasn’t a choice.”

A beat.

Megumi didn’t press. But something in his expression shifted, shoulders drawing back slightly, gaze holding just a second longer than necessary.

Not suspicion.
Recognition.

Like he’d seen that kind of change before. In himself. In others.

But he let it pass.

And Yuji was grateful.

Yuji sat on the edge of the futon. It creaked under his weight like the floor remembering his footsteps.

“I’m trying,” he said.

And this time, Megumi didn’t argue.

—

The walk into Tokyo buzzed with summer heat and civilian noise.

Yuji kept to the edge of the group, hood up, hands buried deep in his jacket pockets. His footsteps made no sound.

Ahead, Gojo led the way like a man on a mission that required sunglasses and no real plan. He pointed at random shops, commentated on bubble tea trends, and name-dropped half the crowd.

“Harajuku’s gotten too clean,” he said. “Back in my day, there was at least one cursed flannel on every corner.”

Megumi didn’t respond. Yuji didn’t laugh.

They were close now.

Yuji glanced at Megumi’s silhouette, walking silent beside him.

It was still jarring.

Megumi alive. Whole. Walking.

It shouldn’t have surprised him anymore, and yet it did.

Because part of him, the quiet part that didn’t speak unless it hurt, had already buried them both.

Megumi and Nobara. Two ghosts walking.

He remembered how Megumi looked the last time, not like this. Not calm. Not quiet. Not in control.

And Nobara—

Her name alone twisted something behind his ribs.

He could still feel the weight of her in his arms. Could still see the blood trailing down her cheek like a cracked vein, her eye ruined, her breath uneven. And even then—

She smiled.

He didn’t know how that smile still lived in his head, clear as if it had happened yesterday. It had broken him then. It broke him now.

She smiled through it. And then she died.

And he had carried what was left of her, long after she stopped speaking.

He’d failed them both.

And now—

A shout rang out ahead.

They turned the corner.

A man in a business suit practically fled from a teenage girl in uniform, who tossed his business card after him like a curse.

“What about me?!” she barked, arms thrown wide. “Scared of a strong female lead?!”

Gojo pointed ahead with both hands. “There she is. Sunshine incarnate.”

Yuji stopped walking.

Nobara.

She looked exactly the same. Hair the same cut. Stance the same, like she owned the sidewalk. Her expression sharp enough to punch through steel.

Yuji stared.

She was standing. She was talking. Loud. Irritated.

Breathing.

His hands curled slowly in his pockets. Don’t make it obvious, he told himself. Don’t freeze. Don’t look like you’ve already mourned her. But his body didn’t move. Not for a full second longer than it should have. Inside him, pressure mounted like a sealed valve. That smile from her final moment, mocking pain with that crooked grin, was still bleeding through his memory, raw as the day it happened.

She turned toward them.

Yuji’s shoulders locked.

She walked up without hesitation, not sparing them more than a glance. “Kugisaki Nobara. I’m not here to babysit anyone.”

Gojo grinned. “Perfect. You’ll fit right in.”

Nobara’s eyes flicked between Megumi and Yuji.

They landed on him.

“You,” she said. “You’re Itadori?”

Yuji’s mouth was dry. He didn’t answer.

The sunlight caught the strands of her hair. She had blood in that same spot. That day.

He hadn’t saved her.

“You gonna keep staring?” Nobara said, one brow lifting. “Or are you always this weird?” Yuji blinked. “Yeah. I’m Itadori.” She narrowed her eyes. “You look like the type who ate glue in kindergarten.”

Yuji’s voice was flat. “Didn’t have glue. We had chalk.”

Nobara snorted. “Figures. Country boy.”

Gojo laughed aloud. “Oh this is going to be great.”

Megumi rubbed his temple. “Let’s just get this over with.”

Gojo clapped his hands. “Initiation time! Nobara, you’re up.”

She cracked her knuckles. “Finally.”

“I’ll go with her,” Megumi said.

Gojo raised a brow. “Ooh, gallant.” Megumi didn’t answer. He just followed.

Yuji stood still for a moment longer, then slowly turned to Gojo.

“I’ll stay back,” he said. “Wanted to talk.”

Gojo, already grinning, less than before, gave him a light nod. “Alright.”

The others walked ahead. Yuji stayed where he was, trying to breathe in a world that kept giving him back people he’d already lost.

The sun hadn’t moved much, but the shadows had shifted. The alley beside the building stretched longer now, creeping toward their feet like spilled ink.

Gojo leaned back against a rusted streetlight just outside the condemned complex, arms folded behind his head, blindfold pushed slightly up to let the late light reach his cheek.

“Kids these days,” he sighed. “First day on the job, and already I’m stuck babysitting.”

Yuji didn’t respond.

He stood about six feet away, eyes tilted toward the roofline like his thoughts were somewhere far above it. His shadow barely moved on the sidewalk, frozen in place beneath the thinning light. Farther inside, Nobara’s voice echoed faintly, something sharp, something irritated.

Gojo’s posture shifted. Just a little. Gojo didn’t say anything at first. He stepped forward, turning fully to face Yuji.

A beat.

Then he nodded once.

They walked a few paces down the sidewalk, slow and quiet, Gojo’s voice low enough not to carry.

And just like that—

—

Inside the condemned building, the air changed.

Megumi moved first, boots quiet against the buckled tile. The long hallway pressed inward with every step, ceiling half-caved, paint blistered from the damp.

Nobara walked ahead of him, arms loose at her sides, shoulders tense, not from fear, but from anticipation.

“I don’t need a babysitter,” she muttered, not looking back.

Megumi didn’t respond.

She glanced at him anyway. “What, you think I’m gonna trip over a nail and cry?”

“I’m the type who keeps people from getting disemboweled on their first day.”

She scoffed. “Relax, I’m not some clueless side character. I’m the main damn cast!”

They passed a room with one door hanging loose on its hinge. A pile of bird bones cluttered the corner. The air buzzed faintly with cursed energy, old and bitter.

“You feel that?” she asked.

Megumi gave a curt nod.

Nobara stopped just outside a doorway that led deeper into the old administrative wing. A steel frame was bent sideways like something had torn through it years ago.

“That it?”

Megumi’s eyes narrowed. “It’s one of them.”

They stepped through.

The inside of the room was a disaster of mold-stained floors and exposed concrete. Fluorescent lights flickered above like nerves misfiring.

Something shifted in the back.

A wet sound, skittering, slapping.

The curse lurched out from behind a toppled filing cabinet.

It was long-limbed and bloated, skin the color of spoiled milk, head stretched sideways as if something inside had grown wrong. Its eyes were bulbous. Empty.

Nobara didn’t flinch.

She reached into her sleeve, pulled a nail from the hem, and held it loosely between two fingers.

The curse hissed.

It sprang.

Nobara threw.

Her hammer met the nail midair with a clean crack, and the curse went down hard, the steel pinning it through the shoulder to the wall.

It thrashed, shrieking.

Nobara stepped forward, unfazed.

“That’s one,” she muttered.

But the curse writhed harder now, dragging itself upward, bone grinding against the nail’s shaft.

Megumi moved behind her, his shadow twitching across the wall. “It’s adapting.”

“Let it.”

She pulled another nail free. But the curse was faster than before.

It lunged.

She raised the hammer, but something slammed her backward, and she hit the floor with a sharp grunt.

The curse bore down.

Too close.

Nobara’s eyes flicked toward the nail still lodged in the wall. Her hand shot out, one finger curling into the air like she was plucking a string.

“Resonance,” she spat.

The nail inside the curse sang, a deep, metallic whine like a tuning fork bent by violence and the creature screamed.

Its body arched as the cursed energy inside it surged unnaturally, convulsing around the point of impact. Blood spilled from its mouth. It tore at its own shoulder, trying to rip free of something it couldn’t touch.

Nobara stood slowly, breathing hard. Her hammer hung loose in one hand.

She walked forward, calm now. Quiet.

The curse spasmed once more and then crumpled.

Dead.

Megumi raised an eyebrow.

She wiped her nose with the back of her wrist. “And that, my guy, is how you bring a nail to a monster fight.”

A pause.

He gave a faint nod. “Not bad.”

“Not bad?” she echoed. “I just turned that thing into a goddamn tack board.”

“You dented the wall.”

She rolled her eyes, but her grin showed teeth. “Whatever. I’ll send Gojo the invoice.”

They moved out of the room and into the corridor beyond.

And upstairs, something else stirred.

—

The hallway creaked overhead.

Yuji tilted his head up, eyes tracking the groan of wood. He didn’t speak.

A moment later, a sharp thud, muffled through the ceiling. Then a second one. Quick. Scrambling.

Inside the condemned building, something was on the move.

Gojo’s posture didn’t change, but his blindfold shifted just slightly as he angled his head to listen.

Yuji’s cursed energy responded, not flaring, just aligning, attuned. A signal. He felt it too.

Then—

A thump. A laugh. Then a very loud, “Oh, gross!” from above.

Gojo let out a quiet breath. “Still alive.”

Yuji didn’t move.

Gojo turned toward him. They stood in the same place where the conversation had happened—the one they didn’t need to revisit aloud.

But it lingered between them.

Yuji’s eyes hadn’t moved from the rooftop. His voice came low, almost too soft to catch. “I didn’t think I’d see any of them again.”

Gojo’s reply was quiet. “But you did.”

A pause.

Inside the building, more noise echoed, Nobara’s hammer, something shrieking and splitting apart. A familiar rhythm: clash, counter, end.

Yuji breathed in through his nose.

He’d heard it before. He’d heard it end before.

Gojo, sensing the tension, said nothing.

Then footsteps echoed, lighter, hurried.

The creak of stairs.

Voices descending.

The door creaked open behind them.

Yuji didn’t turn.

He stood at the edge of the curb, hands in his pockets, hood still half-drawn. The same stillness. But this time, there was a subtle difference.

He knew who would walk out next.

Megumi stepped out first. His sleeve was ripped. There was a faint bruise forming on one cheek. But he didn’t limp. He didn’t wince.

Still steady.

Still whole.

Nobara came next, brushing plaster dust off her skirt. Her hammer hung by her side, still faintly pulsing with cursed energy. Gojo looked them both over like a proud coach. “Well! That was educational. I think we all learned something valuable today.”

Nobara tilted her head. “Like how cursed spirits are uglier than your fashion sense?” “Exactly,” Gojo said, unfazed. “Also, you pass. Congratulations! You are now a proud member of Jujutsu High. No refunds.”

Megumi exhaled. “She already assumed that.” Nobara folded her arms. “You gonna stamp my hand or something?”

Gojo reached into his sleeve and, with impeccable timing, pulled out a half-crumpled sticker that read:
HELLO, CURSED ENERGY USER.

He slapped it onto her arm with flourish. “Stamped.”

Nobara snorted. “You’re an idiot.”

“I’ve been called worse.”

While they bantered, Yuji remained silent just behind them.

His eyes followed Megumi and Nobara in turn.

He tracked the shape of their cursed energy—not strong, not dangerous—but steady. Healthy. Present.

He didn’t step forward.

Nobara noticed. Just for a second. Her eyes flicked to him. Her gaze narrowed. Not in suspicion. Not in greeting. Just something; an awareness.

Yuji didn’t look away.

And Nobara, with a shake of her head, muttered under her breath, “He always look like he’s solving death itself or just spaced out?”

Gojo turned on his heel. “Alright, children. Training’s over. Classes start tomorrow. Maybe. If I feel like it.” Megumi followed, hands back in his pockets. “So… never.”

“Exactly.”

Nobara turned toward the street. “I want yakitori.”

Yuji still hadn’t moved. But he watched them, Megumi walking ahead, Nobara arguing over food, Gojo pretending not to hear either.

They looked like the past he thought he lost. A past given back. Unearned.

Yuji exhaled once. And took a step after them. Not quick. Not hesitant.

Just forward.

REPORT: JULY 2018

IN WEST TOKYO CITY, AT THE EISHU JUVENILE DETENTION CENTER THE SKY ABOVE THE EXERCISE YARD

AN UNNAMED APPARITION OF POTENTIAL SPECIAL GRADE WAS WITNESSED BY MULTIPLE NON-JUJUTSU SORCERERS.

SCINCE IT WAS DEEMED AN EMERGENCY, THREE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS WERE SENT TO THE SCENE.

THE CURSE WAS SINGLE HANDEDLY DEFEATED AND OF THOSE THREE STUDENTS…

ONE DIED

Chapter Text

The rooftop air bit colder than it should have for early summer, like Tokyo had decided to hold its breath. Below, the city ran on in loops, trains, signals, sirens, utterly indifferent to what crouched in its shadows.

Yuji stood at the edge, hands buried in his hoodie pockets, sipping something bitter and half-warm from a vending machine can. He didn’t shiver, but his shoulders were stiff. He was staring at the skyline like it had insulted him.

Behind him came the familiar sound of soft-soled steps light, lazy, deliberate.

“You picked a dramatic backdrop,” Gojo said as he strolled up beside him. “Let me guess. You’re about to quit the team, say something cryptic, and disappear into the mist.”

Yuji didn’t turn. “I’m not the dramatic one.”

Gojo leaned on the railing, sunglasses glinting faintly beneath the overcast sky. “You called me up here. Something’s on your mind.”

“You’re about to head out, right?” Yuji asked, still watching the skyline.

“Unless you’re about to give me a reason not to.”

Yuji finally glanced at him. “The spear.”

Gojo blinked once behind the blindfold. Then his smile, faint but familiar, turned sharper. “Ah. So we’re doing this.”

Yuji gave a nod. “You already know where it is.”

“Yeah,” Gojo said, tone cool but eyes narrowed now. “I buried it in Antarctica. Beneath the glacier altar at the sub-temple. Triple-sealed. Buried deep enough that even cursed spirits get altitude sickness looking for it.”

“I know,” Yuji said. “That’s why you have to go now.”

Gojo gave a long exhale, slow but not reluctant. “You still think I get sealed?”

“Maybe” Yuji replied.

Gojo studied him. “And this is supposed to stop it?”

“It’s won’t stop it but,” Yuji said. “If you’re sealed again—”

“I won’t be,” Gojo cut in, his voice calm but solid, the glint behind the blindfold unmistakable.

Yuji hesitated. “You don’t know that.”

Gojo grinned, cocky and effortless. “I’m Satoru Gojo. I break patterns for breakfast.”

He turned slightly, hands sinking into his pockets like he was walking off a meeting, not sidestepping an apocalypse. “Let them try.”

Yuji was quiet a moment. Then, with something like a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth: “You’ve always been like that, huh?”

“Like what?” Gojo asked, mock-offended.

“Loud. Arrogant. Never actually wrong.”

“I take offense to that. I am occasionally wrong. Just in irrelevant ways.”

Yuji gave the smallest exhale, half a laugh, half a sigh. “I didn’t get it before. Why you acted the way you did. Now I do.”

“Oh?” Gojo leaned in slightly. “Do tell, sensei.”

“You act like nothing can touch you,” Yuji said, voice steadier now. “Because if you didn’t... you’d realize everything already has.”

That landed, just for a second.

Gojo didn’t respond immediately. He turned his gaze outward again. “Well,” he said at last, voice lighter but thoughtful, “that’s bleak.”

Yuji didn’t back off. “You’re not invincible. But you’re what we’ve got.”

Gojo tilted his head. “You say that like you’re not one of us.”

Yuji hesitated again, longer this time. “Sometimes it doesn’t feel like I am.”

Gojo didn’t press. Instead, he said softly, “You’re still you. Just... with some spoilers.”

“Yeah. And knowing what might happen hasn’t exactly made it easier.”

“No,” Gojo said. “But it might make you harder to kill.”

Yuji’s mouth twitched again. “That’s the idea.”

“Okay then.” Gojo stepped away from the railing. “You said you can handle the Finger Bearer?”

“It’s all there,” Yuji said. “Reverse cursed technique, Shrine, Blood Manipulation. I think I have a Domain, it was all a little hazy. Doesn’t matter. I know enough. I have to.”

“You sound terrifying,” Gojo said. “Are you sure you’re not trying to impress me?”

“I’m not.”

Gojo grinned. “Then why am I impressed?”

Yuji shrugged. “Because I’m right.”

“You’ve been spending too much time with me,” Gojo said, and gave a mock sigh. “Alright. I’ll go fetch the murder stick from the icebox.”

“Don’t wait too long,” Yuji said as Gojo headed for the door.

Gojo paused at the stairwell, looking back just briefly.

“You too.”

Then he vanished, just like that, like the rooftop hadn’t existed at all.

Yuji stood alone again. The coffee can was cold in his hand now. The skyline unchanged. The city unaware.

But he was different.

And far beneath his ribs, something stirred. Quietly, patiently, waiting.
—

The detention center loomed behind sagging yellow tape and bent chain-link fencing, rust-streaked and sun-faded like it had never once been safe. Cursed energy clung to its walls in dense layers, oppressive and constant. It radiated outward like heat off asphalt.

A woman stood near the police barricade, clutching a folded photograph with both hands. Her voice cracked when she saw them approaching. “My son, Tadashi he’s in there. Please… I haven’t heard anything…”

She held the photo out. A teenage boy. Too young. Too real.

Megumi barely slowed. “Tadashi Okubo. Vehicular manslaughter. He killed a girl in a hit-and-run.”

The woman recoiled like she’d been struck. “He didn’t mean to. He was just a boy. He panicked—”

Her eyes shifted to Nobara now, searching for something. Mercy, maybe.

Nobara clicked her tongue and stopped long enough to speak. “We’re not here to judge. Something happened inside that building. If we find anyone alive, we’ll get them out. That’s all I can promise.”

It wasn’t warm, but it was honest. The woman nodded, dazed. Her hands tightened around the photograph like it was the only part of her son still breathing.

Yuji said nothing. He glanced at the photo, then away. He didn’t have to guess what they’d find. He remembered this moment. He remembered how long she stood there in the other timeline, silent and unmoving, long after everyone else had packed up and gone home.

Ijichi was waiting for them at the entry checkpoint. His clipboard looked freshly creased, probably from being clutched too hard. He adjusted his glasses as they approached.

“The Curtain is already up,” he said without ceremony. “Surveillance and comms are dead. We’ve lost contact since the cursed signature spiked. Three staff confirmed dead. Five inmates are unaccounted for.”

He handed Megumi a sealed talisman, a pale strip of paper wrapped around something metallic. “Emergency extraction trigger. Five minutes response, best case. But if the Domain collapses or the curse escalates, you’re on your own.”

Megumi accepted it with a nod. “Understood.”

Nobara leaned on her hammer, unimpressed. “And what’s the story for the normals? Gas leak? Meteor?”

Ijichi didn’t look up. “Gas leak. Suspected terrorist activity. Site’s locked down under that cover.”

She scoffed. “Classic. Works every time.”

They moved through the checkpoint, and the building swallowed them whole.

Inside, the air shifted immediately. The light overhead buzzed in strange syncopation, the rhythm just slightly off. The walls looked the same, but they felt… wrong. The hallway tilted ever so slightly, just enough to trick your balance if you weren’t paying attention.

Yuji stopped.

“The pressure’s wrong,” he said.

Megumi scanned the walls. “You feel it too?”

The cursed energy was twisted. Dense. Alive. It wasn’t just lingering, it was pressing. The building had reshaped itself under it.

“We’ve stepped into its Domain,” Megumi said. His voice was sharp. Controlled. “An innate one. It’s warped the interior.”

Nobara tensed. Her mouth twitched, but she held firm. “That’s… this isn’t like anything I’ve felt before. We can’t see it—but it sees us, right?”

Yuji nodded. “It’s watching. But it hasn’t chosen to strike.”

Megumi summoned his Divine Dogs. They appeared above his shoulders with a growl, teeth bared at the shadows. One of them snarled and barked toward the hallway ahead.

“Dogs are agitated,” Megumi said. “It’s trying to lead us apart.”

“Then let it,” Yuji said. His voice was steady. “I’ll draw it down. You two keep moving, keep pressure off the rest of the space.”

Nobara raised an eyebrow. “You sure about that?”

“If we all engage it, we’ll lose someone.”

Megumi watched him carefully. “You’ve got something you’re not saying.”

Yuji didn’t flinch. “I’m saying enough.”

Silence stretched for half a second, then Megumi nodded. “Alright. You draw it. We circle.”

Nobara sighed and twirled her hammer. “If you die trying to be clever, I’m not crying at your funeral.”

Yuji cracked the barest smile. “Wouldn’t ask you to.”

And with that, he turned and headed down the corridor toward the lower levels. The air warped faintly around him, like a mirage forming under pressure.

Behind him, the fluorescent hum got louder. The Domain had noticed.

Yuji moved deeper into the detention center’s bones. The corridors bent subtly where they shouldn’t. What used to be concrete hallways now curved too far or not enough, like the angles had stopped listening to geometry. Doors appeared without frames, stairwells opened downward but never upward.

The cursed energy was thicker here—like tar in his lungs. Each breath dragged a memory with it. He’d walked this hall before, in another life, but now the pressure vibrated under his skin like the whole building was holding its breath. He could feel the domain reacting to him. Not out of strategy, but fear.

The curse wasn’t clever. But it was strong. And now it knew something had entered its den that didn’t belong.

A warped light bulb popped overhead, sending sparks to the floor. Yuji ducked through the frame of a half-collapsed door, stepping into a room where the stink hit him first, copper, rot, bile. Then he saw the remains.

Two inmates—what was left of them—slumped in opposite corners, unrecognizable except for the shape that used to be human. Their bodies were shredded, like meat peeled apart at the joints, but still fresh. One looked like it had tried to crawl. Yuji's throat tightened.

His stomach didn’t turn, he’d learned to control that, but his hand curled at his side, a soft thrum of cursed energy collecting in his fingertips. He looked away. A beat passed before he spoke.

“…Sorry,” he said, quieter this time. Not to the corpses. To the silence that followed them. Then he closed the door behind him without a sound.

He stepped back into the corridor. The walls pulsed faintly, like a throat contracting. Cursed energy surged each time he moved, thickening, multiplying. The domain was breathing. Shrinking.

Not collapsing all at once, but drawing in like a trap tightening its jaw. Yuji could feel it, the curse was coiling the space tighter to cut them apart, isolate him. It wasn’t strategic. It was desperate.

—

Upstairs, the air changed again.

Megumi paused at the second-floor landing. His Divine Dogs had gone still, teeth bared, low growls echoing through the warped hallway.

“The domain’s reacting to us,” he said. “Not attacking. Adjusting.”

Nobara rested her hammer on one shoulder, eyes flicking across the seams of the hallway. “You say that like it’s a good thing.”

“It’s not,” Megumi replied. “It’s afraid of Yuji.”

Nobara arched a brow. “Yuji?”

Megumi’s voice stayed low. “He knows something. It’s in how he moves.”

Nobara tilted her head, thoughtful. “Yeah. He’s pretty weird for someone who just learned about Jujutsu. Confident. Almost cocky. It’s creepy.”

“He’s hiding something,” Megumi said.

“Of course he is.” She shifted her grip. “We all are.”

They kept moving. Their coordinated steps pressed gently against the domain’s edges without triggering it further. It was like walking across a sleeping giant’s chest.

—

Down below, Yuji reached the first-level cell block. The walls were coated in something black and crystalline, curse residue that shimmered like oil. It crackled beneath his shoes with every step.

He stopped.

There.

A vibration beneath the floor. Too rhythmic to be ambient, too slow to be mechanical.

The Finger Bearer.

Yuji exhaled and slid his foot back half a step, grounding himself. He pressed his palm to the floor. His cursed energy surged. He reinforced bone and muscle structure, wrapping power around himself like straps; cursed energy spilled up into his shoulders and spine.

“You’ve been hiding,” he said, voice level. “But not well.”

The floor pulsed under his hand. A shriek echoed, low and shrill and wet.

From the far end of the block, the Finger Bearer stepped into view.

Its form was just like before: swollen arms, distended jaw, that wet sheen of cursed muscle twitching too fast to be natural. Its head tilted sideways, eyes sinking toward Yuji like gravity had changed direction.

Yuji rose to his feet as the spirit opened its mouth, not to roar, but to screech, like metal tearing against metal. Then it charged.

Yuji didn’t move.

The creature lunged, and Yuji pivoted sharply, stepping inside the strike. His elbow cracked into the curse’s forearm with a burst of cursed energy, bone splintered on impact. The Finger Bearer reeled, its arm dangling loose and spasming.

It shrieked again, more furious than hurt, and twisted to bring its claws down.

Yuji ducked low, twisted past its flank, and hammered a punch into its ribs. A ripple of pressure shot out from the blow, cracking the floor in a spiderweb around them. The curse stumbled, tried to regain footing, and Yuji kicked its knee inward.

The leg snapped backward at an unnatural angle, but not permanently. He saw the cursed tissue already beginning to mend itself. He forgothe thing could heal.

Didn’t matter.

He didn’t let up.

Yuji pressed in. He reached out and drew his cursed energy into his hand, forming it for Dismantle, then released the invisible slash into the spirit’s cracked arm. He followed with another one, slashing its torso, the energy flowing faster than his blade arm could swing, finding every soft gap.
His use mirrored what he’s learned so far, effective but still raw compared to Sukuna’s lethal precision

The slash landed deep. The taste of ozone and heat scorched the air. The curse howled, twice louder now.

“Try again.”

The walls rippled. The innate domain was tightening now, not just in panic, but defense. It warped the space around them, trying to box Yuji in before he could finish the job.

Too late.

He braced a hand to the warped wall and invoked more cursed energy. In a burst, he opened Simple Domain, his fledgling ward shimmering around him, steady, stopping the space from crushing inward.

The Finger Bearer charged again, less coordinated, defeated but still dangerous.

Yuji didn’t wait. He met the charge head-on, catching the cursed creature’s shoulder with a reinforced forearm, flipping it off-balance, kneeing it in the chest, and finishing with a downward elbow that smashed it through a warped pillar.

Dust fell in silent shrapnel.

And when the spirit tried once more to rise, trembling, edges fraying, Yuji stepped in close.

He’d fought this thing before.

This time, he was faster. Stronger. Unflinching.

This time, he was winning.

Yuji exhaled slowly through his nose, steam curling in the low light. The Finger Bearer lay embedded in the base of a ruined column, twitching. Dust hung in the air like a held breath. The domain was still tightening.

He didn’t lower his guard. Something in the cursed energy had shifted, warped further. As if the space itself had realized it was losing.

Yuji braced his hand against the floor. His cursed energy rose and settled, steady but slightly off-rhythm. Like breathing with one lung. Above him, somewhere in the spiraled concrete, Megumi and Nobara were still moving, pressing forward carefully. He could feel their presence like pressure points on a map.

“They’re fine,” he said under his breath. “This shouldn’t take much longer”

He turned his full attention back to the Finger Bearer.

It hadn’t moved, but the cursed energy around it was cycling again, drawn inward, pooling fast.

Yuji pressed his feet to the floor and surged forward, cracking the tile. He struck before the spirit could fully rise: one palm into its shoulder, a curse-reinforced sweep kick into its side, then a rising elbow to the jaw. The cursed spirit reeled, crashing into the wall with a shriek.

Yuji didn’t stop.

He pivoted, shot forward, struck again, body low and tight. Every blow landed. He was too fast, too precise. Even with his energy fluxing, his muscle memory knew the dance.

But that’s when it began.

His cursed energy pulsed out of rhythm. His legs landed wrong. Just a little.

He snapped a strike forward, then flinched as the power behind it buckled halfway through.

Yuji blinked.

That wasn’t just fatigue.

His cursed energy, was being pinched. Redirected. Dimmed.

Not from the outside.

From inside.

His breath caught.

Sukuna.

He wasn’t pushing forward. He wasn’t even surfacing. He was simply... adjusting the faucet. Not all the way closed, but more than enough to make Yuji feel the pressure.

Yuji’s pulse spiked. He’d seen this before. Not like this, but close. A disruption in cursed energy flow, something subtle and internal. Something Sukuna had figured out just by watching. By feeling how Yuji held him back.

And now he was returning the favor.

Not with knowledge. With instinct. Cruel, precise instinct.

Yuji staggered half a step back, his vision tightening. The curse took the opening.

The Finger Bearer lunged, and Yuji blocked just in time, his forearms shaking with the impact. He shoved the spirit back and slammed a sidekick into its torso, knocking it off-balance again.

He was still ahead.

But he could feel it now, every step costing more. Every strike draining him faster than it should. His muscles hadn’t slowed, but the energy behind them was being rationed.

Like a phone on low battery.

He exhaled sharply. “You really picked now?”

No answer. Just the flicker of teeth behind his ribs.

He set his stance again.

The curse came for him, arms swinging wildly. Yuji ducked, dodged, drove a punch into its midsection, followed with a cleaving elbow that cracked ribs, but the cursed tissue was already twitching to rebuild. He shifted weight, planted a heel, and slammed a full-body hook into the creature’s jaw. It flailed back, collided with the wall, but caught its footing faster this time.

Yuji rolled his shoulders, cursed energy sparking up through his back. He pushed it outward, Dismantle, if he could focus it. But the line wavered. Instead of a clean slice, it broke apart mid-flight and scattered harmlessly across the curse’s skin.

Yuji didn’t flinch. He moved anyway, fist, knee, backstep, counterstrike. Blow after blow drove the Finger Bearer backward through the collapsing hallway.

The fight was still his.

But he was burning through his cursed energy faster than he could afford.

The curse lunged again. Yuji blocked the swipe, pivoted low, and slammed a punch into its chest, close-range, pure cursed reinforcement. It went down in a heap. For a second.

Then it shrieked and launched back upright.

Yuji gritted his teeth. “Still not enough?”

His chest ached, not from injury. From the fight to hold his own energy. To keep control. Sukuna wasn’t trying to win. He was just reminding Yuji he was there. That if he wanted to, he could take it all.

Yuji charged.

One more rush. One more volley.

He ducked under the claws. Hammered three short jabs into the ribs. Used momentum to swing his knee into the curse’s side, then pivoted and launched it across the hall into the far wall.

This time, the crash was bigger. Deeper. Something cracked beneath the surface.

Yuji staggered, but stayed upright.

The curse snarled, and in that split second, Yuji did something it didn’t expect.

He coughed—blood flecking the inside of his mouth—then snapped his head forward and spat.

The blood hit the Finger Bearer square in the face.

Before it could react, Yuji pulsed cursed energy through it, fast and explosive.

BOOM.

A thin detonation rippled through the curse’s face like shrapnel-laced steam. It staggered, shrieking, claws flailing wide.

The opening was enough.

Yuji moved in fast. Pulled back a fist. Cursed energy sparked along the skin.

“You’re not taking this—”

He struck.

A final, direct blow, chest to chest. The cursed energy flared like fire behind glass. The Finger Bearer dropped.

So did Yuji.

One knee. Then both.

Then his hands.

The floor tilted.

He breathed in, once.

Then everything went black.

And in the hollow between moments, where breath should’ve returned—

Sukuna Laughed.

Chapter Text

Sukuna laughed.

The sound went through the bones first, a low, delighted hum running along tendons and cartilage and what was left of Yuji Itadori’s nerves. For a moment there was nothing but darkness and weight and the memory of impact. Then a breath dragged into lungs that weren’t his.

Sukuna opened his vessel’s eyes.

—

He was on his back.

Cracked tile spread out above him, a spiderweb of fractures around a flickering fluorescent panel. To the left, the Finger Bearer’s corpse hung half-embedded in a broken support pillar, melting slowly into filthy residue. The innate domain’s stench of blood and damp concrete clung to the air.

The brat’s body didn’t move.

But Sukuna did.

He let the lungs finish their inhale, rolled the air over the vessel’s tongue, tasting dust and iron, then exhaled in a slow, measured breath that was nothing like Yuji’s.

Power hummed under the skin.

“Oh,” Sukuna said softly, listening to his own voice. “You’ve been busy, boy.” He pushed one hand against the floor and rose in a single, fluid motion. As he did, the change came over the body like ink spreading in water.

Black markings rippled across Yuji’s skin, first at the corners of his mouth, then over his cheeks, curling down his back, crawling up his arms. Two additional slashes opened over each eye; when he blinked, the brown was gone, replaced by bright, predatory red.

The hoodie, the hair, the height, those were still the Yuji.

Everything else was Sukuna.

He flexed the vessel’s fingers experimentally, curling them into a fist, then spreading them again. Cursed energy answered his slightest impulse, flowing smooth and hot through muscle and bone.  He turned the hand palm-up, watching a faint shimmer of power gather there.

“Stronger than the first time I took over,” he murmured. “Much stronger.”

Interesting.

He glanced over at the Finger Bearer’s corpse. The special grade lay in a twisted heap, skull crushed, chest caved in from the brat’s fists. Its claws were still half-extended. Whatever counted as its organs were splashed in wet arcs across the wall. He grabbed his finger from the thing’s chest and swallowed it whole.

Sukuna tilted Yuji’s head.

“You managed this?” he said. “Hah. Maybe you’re not completely useless after all.”

He could feel the brat, somewhere deep under the surface, a faint, muffled awareness, stunned and submerged.

“Stay there,” Sukuna told him. “Watch.” He touched two fingers to the center of the vessel’s chest. The heartbeat was hard and fast, a frantic staccato under his skin. He waited until the next beat. The next.

Then he pushed.

Flesh parted around his fingers as easily as wet paper. Bone yielded with a crunch and a crack. The sensation was familiar, satisfying. He’d done this before. He’d do it again. Though it’d never been a body he was inhabiting.

Pain rippled outward from the wound, sharp and bright but it was distant, like listening to someone else shout from another room.

He curled his hand inside the cavity, fingers closing around something warm and throbbing.

Yuji Itadori’s heart.

Sukuna pulled.

The organ came free with a wet yank, veins and arteries tearing away in ragged strands. Blood followed, hot and dark, spilling over his wrist.  The heart beat once, twice more, then stilled.

Sukuna dropped it. It hit the floor with a damp thump and rolled until it came to rest against a cracked tile, leaving a smear of viscous red.

The vessel stayed upright. Markings steady. Eyes bright.

“Don’t panic,” Sukuna said, half to the brat in the dark. “If you die, it won’t be because of this.” If he wanted the vessel dead, there were faster ways. This was insurance. A lock on the door. If the brat tried to wrench control back at the wrong moment, he’d pay the proper price.

Sukuna licked the blood slowly from the back of his hand, savoring the copper tang and the faint electric burn of cursed energy laced through it.

“Now,” he said, turning toward the doorway, “let’s see what else new era has to offer.”

He stepped out of the room, leaving the heart cooling on the floor behind him.

—

The falling innate domain reacted as soon as he moved.

Before, when the brat was in charge, the detention center’s corridors had twisted underfoot, angles bending in wrong directions, stairwells folding back on themselves, doors that opened onto places that shouldn’t exist.

Now, the building straightened around him.

The lights steadied overhead, their hum smoothing into a constant drone. Cracks in the walls sealed as he walked past, hairline fractures closing , corners sharpening. The cursed energy in the air shifted, too. It wasn’t just pressure anymore. It was acknowledgement.

Recognition.

Sukuna smiled, small and satisfied. “That’s more like it.”

A leechlike curse that had been plastered into the ceiling seam oozed half out of the plaster as he passed, its pallid face stretching into a round, blank gape. It turned toward him, one glazed eye wobbling. It froze.

Sukuna didn’t slow.

The curse whimpered and dragged itself back into the wall, its body dissolving as it fled inward, trying to get as far as possible from whatever was now walking these halls.

Coward.

He kept going.

Power signatures brushed at the edge of his senses, they were faint echoes, like distant lanterns in fog. One was sharp and restrained, bright and focused beneath layers of deliberate control. The other flared and snapped, raw and impatient.

Sukuna’s grin grew.

“Fushiguro,” he said under his breath, tasting the name. “And the girl.”

He hadn’t cared much, the first time he’d seen the boy. A desperate, glaring brat with a stubborn jaw and an irritatingly rigid sense of duty. But the technique, that had been worth looking at.

He reached a stairwell that should have been broken and impassable. The steps were warped in the middle, bent like a spine twisted too far. As his foot hit the first one, the stone straightened with a crack, edges realigning beneath his weight.

He climbed. Each step brought their signatures clearer. Above, he could feel the residue of a fight recent enough that the energy hadn’t yet had time to sink into the walls. It was probably some curses’ last flailings against Fushiguro and the girl.

The brat had cleaned up the rest on his way down. This was good. It meant the children had enough teeth to be entertaining. “Let’s see,” Sukuna murmured.

At the top of the stairs, the second-floor corridor stretched out, buckled in places where the Domain had tried harder to hold its shape. Doors leaned at odd angles. The fluorescent lights here flickered arrhythmically.

A distant, unseen structure groaned, complaining about being forced back toward normal geometry.

Sukuna ignored it. He followed the blood.

Smears on the wall where something massive had been flung. Scattered spatters low to the floor from a smaller frame, human. Secondary damage: nails embedded into plaster, the faint metallic tang of a cursed tool, spots where shikigami had appeared and vanished, leaving their scent behind.

Voices floated down the hall as he approached. Muffled at first, then clearer.

“…just sit down,” Megumi was saying, his tone flat but edged with strain. “You’re barely standing.”

“I’m standing plenty,” Nobara snapped. Her voice was rough at the edges, breathless between words. “Pretty sure my ribs can’t sue me for worker exploitation.”

“You have at least one fracture. Probably more.”

“Then they’re—”

Sukuna’s smile sharpened.

He stepped around a hanging cluster of exposed wires and into their line of sight.

—

Megumi felt the wrongness hit him like a sudden drop in air pressure.

It was the way the light fell in the corridor, dimming just a fraction without actually changing. The way the hairs on his arms lifted. The way his one of his Divine Dogs, already battered from the fight, slowly turned its head toward the end of the hall, lips peeling back in a silent snarl.

Nobara’s retort died halfway out of her mouth as she followed the Dog’s gaze.

A figure was walking toward them through the dust.

Red hoodie. Short pink hair, mussed and damp with sweat. Broad shoulders.

Yuji.

Only for half a heartbeat. Then he noticed them. Black lines coiled around his face, jagged markings at the corners of his mouth, stripes across his forehead and under his eyes His eyes weren’t their usual warm brown.

They were red.

His smile stretched wider as he saw them noticing. Too wide. Wrong. “Fushiguro,” Sukuna said, the word warm with genuine amusement.

Megumi went very still. Nobara’s grip on her hammer faltered. “What did you do,” she whispered, “to your face?” The Dog’s growl rose, fully voiced now, vibrating in its throat.

“That’s not him,” Megumi said. His mouth felt like it was full of cotton. “Stay behind me.”

Nobara shot him a glare. “You didn’t tell me he could take control like that.”

"That brat thought he had me contained, so,” Sukuna said lightly. He stopped a few paces away, lazy and unconcerned. “Consider it a privilege.”

Nobara lifted the hammer. “You’re that thing inside him.”

“‘Thing’ is rude,” Sukuna replied. “King will do.”

Megumi’s fingers twitched, shaping the beginnings of a sign. “Yuji’s still in there,” he said, more to himself than anyone else. “He has to be.”

“Oh, he’s watching,” Sukuna said. “I am generous after all.”

The Dog lunged. Megumi didn’t have to tell it to. The shikigami sprang forward on its own, teeth bared, claws scraping sparks from the broken tile.

"Sukuna tilted his head, amused.

The Dog’s jaws reached for his throat—

—and snapped on empty air as Sukuna slipped sideways with inhuman smoothness. His hand shot out, fingers clamping around the Dog’s muzzle. A casual twist. It’s jaw cracked, the shikigami shattered in a burst of shadow and white shards, dissolving into smoke that evaporated against his arm.

The recoil of the technique hit Megumi like a punch to the chest. He staggered a step, catching himself on the wall.

“Hm,” Sukuna said dismissively, looking at the fading traces of the Dog.

He didn’t bother to dodge the nail.

Nobara had flung it while he’d been distracted, arm snapping forward with trained speed. The steel pin whistled toward his forehead, cursed energy thrumming along its length.

Sukuna let it reach his skin before moving.

Two fingers rose. He tapped the nail delicately as it passed. It spun, arc reversing with a shriek of air, snapping back the way it had come, accelerated now by the flick of his wrist.

“Down!” Megumi barked. Nobara threw herself sideways. The nail carved a line through the fabric of her sleeve, missing her arm by a finger’s width before embedding itself in the floor with a metallic thunk. She hit the tile hard, hand flying to her ribs as a hot spear of pain shot up her side.

“You bastard,” she hissed, forcing herself onto one knee. “Using my own damn nail—”

“Too slow,” Sukuna said. “Too obvious. Your curse resonates nicely, though. You could make art with enough practice.”

He meant it.

The girl’s energy was raw, ugly, but there was something satisfying about the way it clung to her tools. A kind of violence that struck true. He could appreciate craftsmanship, even in half-finished pieces.

Megumi moved between them, stance low despite the limp creeping into his steps. “Back off.”

He flicked one glance at Nobara’s labored breathing, the way she held her side. Then he stepped forward and vanished.

He didn’t actually disappear. He simply moved fast enough that the space between one position and the next blurred into nothing, and to them he disappeared. One moment he was several paces away. The next, he was in front of Megumi his fist already in motion.

Megumi tried to block. His forearms came up just in time for Sukuna’s punch to crash into them instead of his ribs. The impact still drove him backward, boots scraping on the tile, the shock traveling up through his shoulders.

He slammed into the wall, the breath knocked from his lungs in a hard wheeze. Pain flared across his arms, along his shoulder blades. Nobara’s shout barely registered.

She swung her hammer at Sukuna’s head, a horizontal arc aiming for his temple. He caught the handle with two fingers. And for a heartbeat, the two of them strained, her whole body behind the swing, his grip casual. The hammer didn’t move.

“Cute,” he said.

Then he twisted. The hammer’s handle torqued out of her hands, sending a sharp jolt up her arms. The weapon flew down the hall, clattering against the far wall.

Before she could get her balance back, his hand closed around her throat. He lifted her off the ground with one arm.

Her hands flew to his wrist, nails digging in as she struggled to draw breath.

“Much better up close,” Sukuna observed, studying her like a specimen. Red eyes flicked over her face, the bloodless lips, the grit. “You don’t scare easily.” She kicked at him, boots smacking his ribs. It hurt less than a stiff breeze.

“Put… me…” she forced out, face reddening, “…down, you… bastard…”

“Language,” he chided.

Behind him, Megumi pushed himself off the wall, vision swimming. His hands flashed through signs even as his ribs screamed.

“Rabbit Escape.”

Shadows burst open under Sukuna’s feet. He looked down as spectral rabbit heads surfaced through the floor, their forms half-mist, half-muscle. They swarmed up his legs, clustering around his knees and ankles, their combined bodies pushing at him, tugging him sideways, trying to throw off his balance.

Bright-eyed, relentless, thousands of them. Sukuna laughed. “Persistent little things.” He let the tide knock him half a step off-center, just enough.

Megumi lunged for Nobara, hands grabbing her legs and yanking her out of Sukuna’s grip as the rabbits surged, swallowing vision for a heartbeat in a swarm of ears and fur. She hit the ground hard on her side, coughing, hacking for breath, fingers clawing at the floor as her throat tried to remember how to work.

The rabbits dissolved as quickly as they’d appeared, their task complete. The hall cleared. Sukuna rolled his shoulder where the Dog’s bite had been, the last ache already gone.

“Animal tricks again?” he said, turning back toward Megumi. “Use the good one.”

Megumi was kneeling between him and Nobara, chest heaving, sweat dripping from his chin. His eyes were glassy with pain, but his gaze stayed fixed.

“That’s all you get,” he said.

Sukuna’s smile thinned. “Liar.”

He stepped forward.

Megumi brought his hands together.

The air around him changed.

Shadows thickened at his feet, spilling outward like ink poured onto glass. The temperature seemed to drop. Something cold and damp and wrong lapped at the edges of the hall, puddles forming where there had been none, liquid darkness rippling like shallow water.

“Don’t,” Nobara rasped from behind him. “You’ll—”

He didn’t stop.

“Divine—” Megumi started.

The phrase wasn’t complete, not fully. But the intent was there.

For a split second, he felt it, the raw, powerful, shikigami the boy was summoning.

Sukuna felt his grin widen without meaning to.

“There,” he breathed. “That’s it.”

The brat had grown. He wanted to see it properly. To see where it would go, what it would become if left to ripen. Megumi’s legs buckled as the summoning ritual tore at his already-shredded reserves. Blood dripped from his nose. His fingers shook.

“Pathetic” Sukuna said mockingly

He took one step.

The ritual shattered.

The hallway snapped back around them with a crack like breaking glass. The pools evaporated. The shadows thinned.

Megumi crashed to one knee, palms slamming into the cold tile. He coughed, spat blood, and forced himself back up between Sukuna and Nobara. His body was done. The cursed energy was barely flickering in him, a candle guttering in a storm.

“You should’ve run,” Sukuna told him. Not unkindly. Just observantly. “You can’t even stand, and you’re still—”

“Shut up,” Megumi said.

His voice was raw and ragged and shaking. He looked up at Sukuna with something  akin to stubbornness. It was fury. It was fear. It was all of them layered together.

“You talk too much,” Megumi went on. “For a parasite.”

Nobara, slumped against the wall, managed a broken huff. “Told you,” she wheezed. “He… doesn’t… get social cues.”

Sukuna’s brows drew together slightly. There it was again, that inconvenience. The way these brats insisted on being entertaining. He lifted his hand and cursed energy coiled along his fingers, thin and sharp and invisible to ordinary eyes, the beginning of a slash that would carve through flesh and bone and wall with equal ease.

Dismantle.

He angled it toward Megumi’s throat. Behind the vessel’s face, Sukuna’s focus narrowed. One strike. Clean. He could always find other toys later.

Megumi steadied his stance and his shoulders shook but he didn’t move.

“Nobara’s behind me,” he said quietly. “You hit me, you hit her too.”

Sukuna’s smile showed teeth. “Even better.”

“Yuji,” Megumi said.

Sukuna’s fingers stilled.

He hadn’t spoken loudly. But there was something in the way he said the name that grated across Sukuna’s patience.

“You’re talking to the wrong one,” Sukuna said.

Megumi ignored him. His eyes locked onto the vessel’s face with a focus that cut through the markings, past the red eyes, straight into wherever he imagined Yuji might be. “You hear me?” he said. “I don’t know how far back you are, but you’re there. I know you are.”

Sukuna’s jaw flexed. “He’s not coming out. He knows better.”

Nobara dragged in a breath that sounded like glass shards. “If you can… hear us,” she rasped, “I’m… going to kill you myself if you leave us alone with this freak.”

“You’re… both… insane,” Sukuna said, honestly baffled. “He’s gone. I ripped his heart out. If he takes the body back now, he dies. Maybe instantly, maybe slow. Either way, it ends the same.”

Megumi’s eyes didn’t move. “Good,” he said.

Sukuna stared.

“If you die saving us,” Megumi said, “that’s better than leaving us here to die because you were scared.”

Nobara made a strangled sound. “Wow,” she said. “Inspirational.”

“Shut up,” Megumi snapped, voice cracking. “I’m not good at this.”

He took one step forward, putting himself more firmly between Sukuna and Nobara. His legs shook but he didn’t fall. “You said you wanted to fight,” he went on. “To help find all of Sukuna’s fingers. You just beat a special grade curse that neither me or Nobara could’ve even hoped to beat. So don’t you dare run now just because it hurts.”

Sukuna couldn’t feel Yuji’s fear. He could feel something else. A stir, like fingers pressing against glass.

“You’re not allowed to die for nothing,” Megumi said, breathing hard. “If you die, it’s because you made it mean something. You get me?”

Nobara laughed weakly, then winced, clutching her side. “I’ll… haunt you… if you let this loser kill us,” she muttered.

Sukuna’s grip on the cursed energy tightened. “You really think,” he said slowly, “that a few pretty words—” Something shoved back.

Not physically, but inside him. It made his arm twitch his arm twitched.

An intrusive impulse, a misfire along the nerves. His fingers spasmed, the gathered energy flickering for a bare instant. He snarled. “Stay down, brat.” The vessel’s chest tightened around nothing. The mark at the corner of his mouth twinged.

Sukuna concentrated. He’d ripped the heart out. If the soul was stupid enough to try to retake the throne, let it. He’d watch it burn from the inside. It would be instructive.

But the brat wasn’t pushing like the panicked animal he was expecting. He was pushing like he’d already decided, like he was content with what would happen after he took back his body. Sukuna felt it in the way the muscles under his control locked, then shuddered, in the way the cursed energy tried to slip his leash, flowing in directions he hadn’t chosen.

“Absolutely not,” Sukuna hissed. He stepped forward to finish it before the interference worsened.

His leg didn’t respond.

For a heartbeat, their body was frozen, caught between two commands.

And Megumi saw it. “You better come back,” he said, voice shaking with fury and fear and something else. “If you die, I’m never forgiving you.”

Nobara’s eyes were glass-bright. “Yeah,” she croaked. “You don’t just get to die. Ya hear that!”

Sukuna’s control faltered again. The markings across the vessel’s face flickered. Red bled toward brown at the edges of his irises, then snapped back.

It was irritating.

It was fascinating.

“What are you—” he started.

The brat hit him. Not with fists, but with his will.

Sukuna had worn a thousand bodies in a thousand ways, torn through flesh and bone, stitched himself into organs and veins. He knew how a vessel moved when it broke. He knew how they screamed.

This wasn’t that.

This was a shove from underneath, a surge of something stubborn and bright and vicious that lashed up through the core of the vessel and slammed into his grip. For a moment, just a moment, Sukuna saw something that wasn’t the hallway. Not fully. Just a flash: a sky he didn’t recognize, a pile of rubble, a hand reach—

He crushed it.

The vision vanished. But the shove didn’t.

Yuji Itadori grabbed his own body and yanked.

Sukuna’s fingers jerked open, the gathered Dismantle scattering harmlessly into the air. His raised hand dropped a few inches. His foot slid.

The markings around his eyes sputtered.

You little—

He pulled back hard, trying to shove the brat down, to slam the door shut again. If the vessel wanted to fling itself into death, let him wait until after the killing was done, at least. This was wasteful. This was—

The world lurched.

Sukuna’s view of the corridor dipped.

Megumi’s face blurred, then sharpened. Nobara’s, pale and blood-streaked, swam at the edge of his sight. The walls around them groaning.

He felt his own mouth move.

The voice that came out was still rough, still strained, but—

Not his.

“Sorry,” Yuji said.

Sukuna’s awareness was shoved back, away from skin and muscle, into something deeper and darker. He slammed against its edges, furious, but the vessel he’d been piloting was already falling forward, the heartless chest hitching once, then twice.

Yuji lifted his head just enough to meet Megumi and Nobara’s eyes.

The markings were gone.

The red was gone.

Just an idiot boy, smiling like something—anything about this was okay.

“See you soon,” he whispered.