He stepped out of the oppressive room with an easy cadence in his pace.Despite how annoying he had found the atmosphere, it was something he was admittedly used to; stoicism born of discipline had led him through multiple such meetings.
Ignoring the unfamiliar way the more traditional haori flowed with his stride, he turned the corner to see the waiting forms of Satoru, Utahime, Mei-Mei, and an unfamiliar man bearing blond hair and green eyes with something as rare as a pure white stallion running about metropolitan Tokyo—a thick heavy beard.
The four of them were seated on two long benches in the traditionally styled hallway, with the benches resting on both sides. He doubled his pace and strode to meet them.
He came to an easy stop before a grinning Satoru and returned his older cousin's grin with a softer smile.
"How was it?" Satoru asked after a quick ruffle of his hair as soon as he sat down beside him.
He waved the hand off and moved to his seat before replying. "More exhausting than facing the sorcerer killer."
"Only you would say that."
Mei Mei cut in with a smile. He looked at her again and had to wonder about her age. Even seven years after the first time he met her, she hadn't aged a day physically. Despite the woman's flirtatious nature and strange interest in him, he had never given her much thought.
Now gray eyes picked up the way her clothes hung tightly to her physique, highlighting her figure in a way that drew his eyes like nothing else did. A thick thigh lay over the other as she sat in a lounging posture opposite him with all the grace of a curious cat.
She eyed him back with her single exposed eye and a growing smile before he forced his eyes away and shrugged off the unfamiliar feeling, purposely ignoring the way her eyes lit up.
It brought to mind memories of Izumi. Memories he had been suppressing with all he had for as long as he could remember. But puberty had a way of shaking things loose.
He had lost control over himself more times in the past few months than he had done in the past seven years. It was only the conviction formed of another lifetime of war that helped him focus as much as he had.
"Finally designated me a grade," Jiki spoke up again in an attempt to distract himself even as he moved his eyes from Mei Mei to the blond-haired foreigner.
"Oh, they did? Any guess at what it is?" Satoru replied with glee while rubbing his hands together with a mischievous smile.
"Nobody is stupid enough to take you up on that bet, Satoru. Even if the other clans tried to hinder his promotion in fear of the Gojo accumulating more power, it would be impossible to shackle Jiki. Not after the Jorogumo Incident." Mei Mei replied with a smile.
"Another Special grade then?" The man finally spoke up. His voice was rough, and his Japanese was accented with something rougher.
"Yes," Jiki replied with an easy nod as he focused completely on the stranger. His gray eyes transitioned smoothly into the three-tomoe form of the Sharingan, and the man flinched for a split second, so fast it would've been missed by almost any other person.
But he was not any other person, was he? The man had little curse energy, at least with respect to the monsters like Satoru and Mei Mei. If Jiki was going to guess, he would've pegged him for a grade two or three sorcerer.
The man stayed silent for a second before he introduced himself, "The name is Ivanov Boris." The man started, and it took him a split second to place the name. He was only vaguely familiar with the world outside Japan, but the guttural tone and intonation cleared whatever doubt he had—the man was Russian.
A nation, if his borderline photogenic memory was correct, one that was just as treacherous as the land of snow. What sort of monsters would such lands create?
"If you've been classified as a special grade, then my coming here was somewhat of a waste," the man admitted with a frown.
"Ohhh?"
"My original intention was to invite you to our prestigious school of Zagovory. But if you've managed to attain the special grade rank already, I don't think they will be letting you go anytime soon."
Jiki gave a nod of acknowledgment. He had never given much thought to how sorcery worked outside Japan. He remembered Satoru saying sorcerers and cursed spirits were more common and stronger in Japan than in other countries, but never the why.
"Apologies, but I was mandated to attend a school in Japan here. I'm guessing that's why you guys are here?" He looked at the smirking form of Mei Mei and the smiling and straight-backed form of Utahime.
"Somewhat," Mei Mei agreed easily. "You're a special grade now. The fourth and youngest special grade in recent history, achieving the rank even faster than Satoru. The higher-ups would do anything to have you under their thumb, which leads us here. Gakuganji sent Utahime ahead to invite you to Kyoto Jujutsu High, which is the sister school to the one in Tokyo here."
Utahime smoothly continued from where Mei Mei stopped, "It is also the most prestigious school in Japan, sitting on the foundational, sacred, and blessed land of Kyoto. I'm sure a child of your talents would be happy to be fostered in the best school in the world."
Jiki sent searching eyes to the side and witnessed the wide grin that was plastered on Satoru's face. "Mau Mau, are you really trying to steal my cute little Jiki-kun from right under my nose?"
"Of course we are," Mei Mei agreed easily with an even larger smirk to match Satoru's grin. "The higher-ups promised at least five million yen if I managed to convince him over. Anything to get him away from your horrible influence. So what do you say Jiki-kun."
"I don't care," He answered without much thought and to the surprised glance from the three people present. Yet somehow Satoru's grin got even wider. Of course, Satoru was the only one here with an actual idea of his thought process, wasn't he?
"I'm still fourteen for a few months, which means I've till I'm fifteen to make a real choice," he added as he transitioned to his feet. "Till then?" He let out a shrug. "I plan on continuing my vacation." He finished with a pointed stare at Satoru that was answered with a laugh. A split second later he felt space-time twist around him as Satoru clasped his hands together, and then he was gone.
xxxx
"Do you think he's coming back?" She asked Big sister Aiko even as she wrung her hands nervously on the walk to Fumi's place.
"Soon I hope," Aiko replied to her with a basket in hand and a soft smile for her.
The past few days had been strange. Her grandmother had always told her vague stories of past eras and her role in taking over when she was gone.
Yet the scale of what had happened was not something she had ever considered possible.
Even a glance around showed how much the village had changed. How much the landscape had shifted and rearranged because of him.
The mountain range that had been there for centuries before she was born had been cut off mid-height in a feat that she had not thought possible.
She remembered the thrill of the moment. The intense sensation of fear and rapturous joy she had felt the moment she woke up. The moment she heard him call god. The moment he sundered and rearranged the world around her village just because he could.
She tried her best to ignore the empty houses they walked past. She had seen the remains of the denizens before the fight had gotten so chaotic. The mummified and desiccated forms still kept her up at night sometimes.
Jujutsu.
She had asked her grandmother about learning more with motivation stemming from what she had experienced. Her grandmother's only reply was for her to wait till Jujutsu High.
She forcefully shifted her thoughts back to better things. Like Jiki, she admitted with a blush on her face that was thankfully hidden by her hair bangs.
He had looked barely older than her when they first met. His White locks framed a soft face with sad grey eyes. Features that made him seem so fragile. Trying to reconcile the image with the short-haired intense teen that cut a mountain range in half was almost ridiculous.
Maybe he would teach her to do the same?
Speak of the devil, and there he was she realized with an even brighter blush.
He walked down the road giving a lazy and apathetic glance at the surrounding empty houses before sighting them. Even this far off she could sense something off about him. Something different.
Especially now that she had seen beyond the facade that was his bored mask. Those lazy glances were his eyes picking up on almost everything and categorizing them, she realized with hindsight.
He was dressed in a white yakuta and a black one-handed haori over it, with Geto sandals on his feet. It was a very distinct image from the sweatshirt and shorts-clad teen that walked into the village a week ago.
"Jiki!!!" She called out in a wave before he got to them.
"How've you been Nobara?" He asked with a smile that sent her flustering again, which forced Aiko to answer for her. God dammit. She was Nobara Kugisake. Lion of the village and granddaughter of the Old Terror, she was never shy!!!
"We've been helping the village recover and settle back into the way things used to be over the past two days you've been away. Considering they were aware of Jorogumo, it has not been all that difficult, although-" Aiko gave a look at the empty houses before continuing. "It has not been the easiest either. We've lost some people and scars like that don't come off quickly."
Jiki answered with a subdued nod as he stared at the houses with an empty expression that reeked of apathy. But this close to him, she could see the way his hand, covered by the black haori, was clenched tight.
"Where did you go to?" She finally found her words and butted into the conversation, changing the gloomy topic.
"Oh, I was summoned by the higher-ups about Jorogumo's sealing." Even the sheer mention of her name sent chills down Nobara's spine, and she only had bare memories of the woman.
Jorogumo.
A blurry figure that faced the manifestation of a god head-on without fear. That is all she managed to piece together days later.
"What about you? Seems like I caught you guys halfway to somewhere."
"We're visiting Fumi," Nobara replied. She had finally found her voice back, she realized in that moment. And Aiko had kept quiet to allow her to lead the conversation this time.
"Mind if I walk with you?"
"Sure," she agreed easily even as she started telling him about everything he had missed over the last two days.
xxxx
She could feel his cursed energy the moment he appeared in the town. That dense, borderline malevolent cursed energy.
It was not any bigger than it originally was, even if it was already above average. No, where it differed was the texture of his cursed energy. If cursed energy was the combined negative feelings found in humans, his own seemed otherworldly and drenched in so much blood and regret. The texture of cursed energy you would find on a man six times his age with enough regrets to drown the world.
The sheer maliciousness of it would've put her off if she didn't know the boy himself.
That was honestly the real reason why she had attacked him the moment she saw him the first time. Her clear dislike of his clan aside.
He suddenly disengaged from walking with Nobara and Aiko, and she had a feeling she knew why he had suddenly changed direction and started heading her way.
Ruminating back on his cursed energy, there was something insidious beneath his usual curse energy. A touch of something even more malevolent swimming beneath his curse energy. Like a shark in a pool of blood, ever hungry and yet surrounded by enough. She supposed it had something to do with how he sealed Jorogumo.
So she busied herself with preparing tea for two and her signature cookies while still making sure his tea was bitter, without milk or sugar. It won't do for the spiteful old woman character she loved so much to be broken by a sweet tea.
Her cackling was interrupted by a knock on the door, so she straightened up, schooled her visage into its perpetually angry mask, and picked up her cane.
The door was opened, and the now short-haired brat greeted her with a polite half-bow.
"Old hag."
"Monstrous brat."
With the formalities done with, she led him back to the kitchen where their waiting cup of tea sat. He dragged out her chair, and she sat gently before he slid it back and turned to his own seat.
He sat down with a grace that she envied, but for people like them, getting old was fortunate enough already, so she was used to the brief bout of that particular emotion.
He sat and took a sip of his tea, swallowing the no doubt bitter tea without even a twitch on his regular placid visage. Tch, the unflappable bastard.
Her attempt at needling him was seemingly a waste. Oh well, she had the whole of his vacation to continue their fun game.
"I'm guessing you came here to ask about your mother," she started, the question rhetorical.
"How did you know?"
"It wasn't that hard to figure out. She left here with Aiko in her hands, and you come back, hand to hand with Aiko. More importantly, you look so much like her."
The kid turned his eyes to his tea. Was that a crack in his facade? Even if it was, she couldn't find it in her to wrench that particular one open. So she continued talking.
"She was a fair one, the lass was," Old woman Kugisaki reminisced about the woman with a mixture of a frown and smile.
"Soft features like yours, with the matching little stress marks. The major differences between you two were her bright smiles. But growing up in a clan like the Gojo, I guess she was the exception.
"I'm not certain about her technique, but I know it had something to do with sealing curses before transforming them into something else. She came here with the old clan head while chasing after it."
"She knew about the special-grade cursed spirit?" he asked.
"Of course she did. Despite the higher-ups' effort to contain and destroy news about her, Jorogumo was a notable figure in the Hein era and just before her sealing."
"So what happened?" The kid asked at the edge of his seat. "What happened to Gojo Mikoto here?"
This time she released a tired sigh in response to the question. It was one of those old memories she preferred being stuck in the back of her mind.
At times like this, she cursed her imminent dementia for not taking away the harder memories.
"Kimiko tricked them. I don't know the details as I was too late by then. What I do know is that after they had partially unsealed her and realized what they had done, your mother did something to reseal the cursed spirit. Something she never recovered from. A few months later, I heard she died giving birth to a child. I had not given it much thought other than mourning her death.
For her child to come back and seal Jorogumo, seemingly with a permanent measure, fate sure has a sense of humor." She allowed a bitter laugh to slip out and watched the kid blink back wet eyes.
Fate definitely had a morbid sense of humor, she decided, forcing herself to her feet and taking the used cups with her, giving the kid some alone time.