Chapter Text
11:51
Tuesday, March 20
2 Unread Messages (now)
Megumi furrowed his brows, feeling his face tighten. The glass roof of the abandoned shopping mall should have already opened a window to the blue sky, but instead, it was still only the tacky darkness of the veil looming over them.
Shaking the remaining droplets of purple gore off his shoes, courtesy of the curse he just punched a hole through, he whipped his phone from his pocket and quickly tapped for Nobara’s contact. Their devices were connected through Bluetooth rather old-fashionedly, but no service under the veil meant no data, and no data meant no other way of communication in case something got messy during mission.
There was already a message waiting from her.
Kugisaki Nobara
yo fushiguro
wru?
Fushiguro Megumi
I’m heading downstairs. did you exorcise them all? the veil is still up
Kugisaki Nobara
ik its weird, cu downstairs
Fushiguro Megumi
you text just like Gojo, I can’t understand either of you
Kugisaki Nobara
fnck you too see urchin
Megumi walked to the nearest disabled escalator, and keeping an eye out for any source of cursed energy nearby, he quickly made his way down to the lobby.
Nobara was already waiting for him by the drained fountain. Judging by the tilt of her head, she too was eyeing the veil that should’ve already lifted above them.
“Oi, Fushiguro, you liar!” she grunted, her eyes seeking murder. Megumi sometimes wondered who was the lunatic that allowed a girl of her caliber to hold a metal hammer. Though at Jujutsu Tech one never had to look too long to find a lunatic. “I knew you understood my texts!”
Megumi leaned away from Nobara’s hand before he was targeted by one of her casual greetings expressed in some form of violence.
“Sometimes I wish I didn’t,” he said. “We should search the building again; we must have missed a curse somewhere.”
“Did you check every store?” Nobara frowned incredulously.
Megumi attempted to discreetly tuck his face behind the collar of his uniform, though he doubted that Nobara missed the way his face warmed up in answer to her question. There was only one store he didn’t spend too much time inside, one that sold mostly lace underwear for women. But to confess to Nobara out of all people that he was too much of a hormonal teenager to spend more than half a minute in a women’s underwear shop, Megumi would’ve chosen a slow and painful death.
“Um, yes, didn’t see nothing,” he coughed, thankful that Nobara either didn’t notice or didn’t care about the reason for his embarrassment. “I can’t sense any more cursed energy though.”
“Yeah, me neither, place should be clean. Anyway, you start from the top floor now, I’ll go check the basement garage first,” Nobara sighed, and Megumi mentally and perhaps a little shamefully high-fived himself for not having to go to the creepy, dimly lit place again. Demon dogs and a giant shikigami python in his arsenal were nice enough, but flickering lights and suspiciously red smears across the concrete walls? Even he had his limits. At least the things that could be punched were relatively safe.
“Yessir,” Megumi muttered sarcastically, earning another irritated look from the girl. “Be careful,” he added, even if he knew it was completely unnecessary and a waste of time. Nobara was known to dive headfirst into all kinds of dangerous situations without a second thought. Who else would just turn out to be the vessel for the King of Curses overnight?
Probably someone reckless, like Kugisaki Nobara, Megumi sighed internally.
While said vessel began scouring downstairs, Megumi searched for any leftover curses on the third floor, absentmindedly humming along to a verse of a K-pop song that got stuck in his head that morning. It was all Nobara’s fault really; lately, she’s been outright forcing Megumi to listen to her songs every waking moment they spent together, and even the time they didn’t spend together. Their dorm room walls weren’t thick enough to keep out the noise she was blasting on Spotify.
Popping in and out of shops and bathrooms, he quickly covered most of the floor; he even looked under the stalls in the bathroom to make sure that he didn’t miss anything, and he really didn’t miss anything.
The third floor was squeaky clean from cursed energy, not a single fly head was lurking in the piles of women’s undies, which Megumi did dig through with burning ears.
But the veil was still up, and Megumi started wondering if this would turn out to be one of those post-apocalyptic movies where the main characters got stuck in some random remote location, like that one where some teenagers were trapped on a ski lift. What Gojo liked about that movie, he could never grasp in his right mind. Perhaps it was not the movie, but Megumi’s mortified reaction to it. Another item on the list of ‘Movies You Should Not Show to a Ten-Year-Old.’
At least here in an ex curse-infested shopping mall they had canned food to ration until help arrived.
This place was more than ideal for a movie like that. A bit run down but, a bit eerie; boom, blockbuster of the year, starring a probably too excited Kugisaki Nobara and a reluctant Fushiguro Megumi. Featuring Gojo Satoru? An entire nightmare in the making.
“Did he lock us up here on purpose?” he grumbled to himself while roaming the shops. That did sound like something that maniac would do because there was not a single trace of–
He stopped, all the hairs suddenly perked up on the nape of his neck.
At first, he thought he was imagining things. The silence of the large, open spaces of the stores could’ve been pulling tricks on him, but he was almost sure he had heard something.
Standing in complete silence he waited until he heard it again, faint and distant, like the rustling of a mouse. Maybe the voice of a child.
Clenching his fists, knowing too well that creepy places hid even creepier cursed children, and he quietly followed the voice to the last store.
The place, looking like some weird toy store for science-obsessed kids, was dark like the rest of the shops, since the electricity had been completely shut off in the building. Megumi remembered the place from the last time he searched the floor just half an hour ago, but he definitely didn’t remember seeing a curse in there.
With his arms raised, ready to fight, Megumi stepped inside.
The voice was a lot clearer now, high-pitched, and soft, coming from behind the isle stacking plastic dinosaurs.
Taking a deep breath, his voice edging to dip into the shadows and summon his demon dogs, Megumi peeked around the structure. A sorcerer could never really prepare for the image of the curse that would be greeting them, and this was one of those cases.
The shock of the bright cherry blossom hair was the first thing that struck Megumi. It was almost like Gojo sensei’s hair, he thought, arching to defy gravity.
The child sat on the ground, back facing Megumi, looking around the age of twelve or thirteen judging by the thin shoulders. The loose yukata wrapped around them almost looked like it was about to swallow their figure in whole. It looked like they were playing with a bunny plushie, but one thing that was clear as… well, not as clear as day, because the veil was still up and the sky dark, but it was clear anyway that apart from a strange aura that had Megumi’s throat itching, the child had no significant cursed energy.
Megumi silently cursed under his breath. They should be heavily reprimanded for missing a child on their first sweeping of the building. The questions regarding where they came from or the whereabouts of their parents could be waiting though, until the kid was safe and sound outside.
Babysitting a kid was the last thing any sorcerer needed while a curse of mysterious locations was still roaming free, but it was the morally correct and sanest option.
“Um, hi,” he spoke softly so as to not startle them.
He watched as the child perked up upon hearing his voice, They turned around, and Megumi jolted a little in surprise. Instead of a human face, it was an orange tiger mask staring back at him with red strings securing it to the kid’s head. Tiny golden bells chimed on either side of the mask as they lifted their face to look at Megumi.
“Oh,” Megumi chuckled awkwardly. He wasn’t a natural with kids. “That’s a cool mask, where did you get it?”
When he got no answer, he licked his lips anxiously. He needed to get this child to safety as soon as possible; it was already a miracle that they didn’t get hurt.
“My name is Megumi,” he introduced himself with a reassuring smile. “What’s your…”
The smile froze on his face as his gaze slowly sank to the hands still holding the bunny plushie. He felt a cold sweat breaking out on his nape.
The kid’s hands were pale, almost sickly so, and their nails were an unnatural purplish black color, but unlike nail polish, the color looked like it was tainting the fingernails from within the flesh.
His mind began searching for possible explanations, but before he could come up with something reasonable, the child lifted the mask from their face, shifting it to the side, and the shopping mall burned up in a powerful flame of white-hot cursed energy.
There was so much of it that Megumi had to brace his feet on the ground so he wouldn’t be thrown off balance by the sheer power of it. Every single cell in his body protested against the invisible assault, and Megumi raised his fists facing each other vertically without a second thought. Shivers ran down his spine when he finally caught a glance at the curse’s face.
Underneath the messy pink fringe, an unsettlingly bright yellow set of eyes bore into Megumi’s. Its face was girlish and boyish at the same time, and probably the most beautiful and at the same time, unnerving sight Megumi had ever seen in his whole life.
He was stunned speechless, and that momentary hesitation was the only reason why the curse did not get exorcised the moment the tiger mask fell.
They were staring at each other, eyes wide, emerald meeting golden, and then the sweetest, most adorable smile curled on the curse’s lips.
“Hello, Megumi-san,” it cooed in a high-pitched voice. It was the scariest thing Megumi had ever heard precisely because, under any other circumstance, it wouldn’t have been scary at all. There was no trace of the trembling, screeching tone of the typical curses; it was warm and affectionate, something that did not suit a curse with such a threatening aura of cursed energy.
And speaking of which: why was it talking? Since when did curses talk? Or make conversation.
Those pale yellow eyes fixed on his face with intelligence he had never seen on curses before, and it made Megumi hesitate. It was stupid. This was a curse, after all, the curse that was the reason the veil still hadn’t lifted. A curse that Megumi should have exorcised immediately.
But the energy that felt heavy in the air told Megumi that this curse, though looking weak and friendly, was probably higher ranking than him and Nobara combined. A grade two? No, grade one? Fuck, it could’ve potentially been a special grade. The way it spoke, almost like it was alive, it wasn’t simple mimicry, was not something just any curse could do.
The curse continued looking up at him with wide doe eyes, blinking occasionally and drawing Megumi’s attention to its thick, pink eyelashes and eyebrows. There was water dripping from his lashes and hair, though its source was not of the human world.
Then as if the curse grew self-conscious under Megumi’s intense stare, it held onto the tiger mask tighter with its little hands, and its lips trembled. The sigh almost tricked Megumi’s protective side into taking over.
“Are you also scared, Megumi-san?” it asked quietly, its tone making the boy’s heart squeeze a little.
Megumi did not know what to say, or if he had anything to say at all. He knew he should either exorcise it while it still looked like it wasn’t about to attack him or find Nobara to regroup. But looking at the small figure cowering a few feet away from him on the ground, holding onto the bunny like a lifeline, he suddenly couldn’t imagine killing something so beautiful without feeling like a monster.
It’s part of its strategy, his rational mind warned him while he slowly crouched down.
The curse blinked up at him, and Megumi lost his ability to think once again. Shit, this is not good. He was completely at this curse’s mercy; the way it slowly wrapped Megumi around its pale pinky finger with a few bats of his lashes, Megumi wasn’t sure if he could fight back against a sudden attack.
Luckily, the curse didn’t seem to have that intention just yet.
The way it was staring at him though made him feel like he was turned inside out, butt naked, with all his secrets and worst fears written out plainly on his skin. Its gaze was very similar to Gojo-sensei’s, Megumi thought, the way it pierced through one’s body and soul.
He should probably do something.
“Are you alone?” he blurted out the first question that came to his mind, and on rare occasions such as this he understood why Nobara always called him an idiot. Only idiots started conversations with abnormal curses.
Said curse tilted its beautiful little face to get a better look at him.
“I got separated. Now I’m alone. No one else wanted to talk to me, so I hid from them.”
“I see… Who were you separated from?” Megumi asked, trying to sound as innocent as possible. If there were any more curses in hiding, maybe this was a more energy-preserving method of finding out. That tiger mask somehow concealed a great amount of cursed energy, and he couldn’t be sure that this was the only one.
The curse-child scooted a little closer to him, and Megumi didn’t know if he was stupid or brave for not taking a couple of steps back. He couldn’t help it, though, the curse’s eyes were mesmerizing. From up close he could see speckles of light floating around the pupil.
“I can’t remember. Can you help me find them? I’m scared. There are ugly monsters here,” the curse lowered its voice like it was sharing a secret. It was uncanny how convincingly it acted the part of a real child. “They have gross eyes on their skin.”
Megumi slowly nodded, and his voice came out as quiet as the curse’s. “Yeah, I hate it when they have a lot of eyes too.”
“Are you like them, Megumi-san?” the curse suddenly eyed him with a hint of distrust, and wasn’t that just ironic.
“Just Megumi is fine. And no, I’m a sorcerer.” Should I be telling you this? What is happening here? “My job is to hunt those ugly things with many eyes and kill them,” and kill you too. “Do you have a name? You already know mine, so it would be fair if you told me yours.”
Hearing that, the smile hardened on the curse’s lips, and it took Megumi a second to realize that its expression was now full of sadness. “I don’t think I have a name. Nobody ever loved me enough to give me one.”
Love?
Megumi was so confused. Emotions, let alone love, were not something that should come out of curses’ mouths, they should not be able to grasp what emotions meant. And yet here was this curse, talking about it– yearning for it, even.
“That’s okay,” he said simply because he didn’t know how else he could reply. He was stalling for time, trying to buy himself a couple more minutes before Nobara tracked the cursed energy back to this… thing. Then together they could figure out what to do.
“Are you nervous, Megumi-san?”
“I told you, just Megumi is enough.”
The curse pouted. “Megumi-nii, then. Why are you nervous?”
“I guess I’m just not used to, um…” hesitated the boy, “talking to curses. And I’m kind of afraid you will attack me.”
It blinked at him again with doe eyes full of curiosity, voice now tinted with confusion. “Why would I?”
“You don’t want to? Attack me, I mean?” Megumi furrowed his brows, kind of feeling like an absolute moron for half-believing a curse’s words, but then again, there wasn’t a single curse out there similar to this one.
“No,” the curse shrugged its shoulders like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “You’re a lot bigger than me. I would lose.”
“Huh,” Megumi deadpanned. A lot bigger? Physically, maybe, but that was certainly not the case when it came to their cursed energy.
Megumi started to wonder if the curse was really as naïve and clueless as it presented itself.
He was about to speak again, when suddenly his phone chimed, startling him.
“Oh, shit!” he cursed under his breath, and quickly glanced at the curse, looking for any signs of hostility or fright, but it simply looked at the device, then raised its intense gaze back on him.
Kugisaki Nobara
did u feel it? there’s so much crsd energy that i cant trace it back to a source
Megumi stared at the cracked screen, wondering what the hell he should tell her.
Hey, I found the crazy strong curse but it’s too cute and I don’t want to kill it?
Yes, I’ve found the source, I’m currently chatting with it.
He scratched his neck, all the while the curse’s eyes never stopped tracing his movements. If Megumi was to survive this encounter, if either of them was, then Nobara will not stop accusing him of being a pussy until the day he dies.
He let out an aggrieved sigh and started typing.
Fushiguro Megumi
third floor, weird toy store for kids
don’t run, stay calm please
Kugisaki Nobara
tf??
“I- uh, have a friend,” Megumi spoke hesitantly, and the curse’s eyes twinkled brightly hearing that. “She’s coming here, and she might be a little afraid of you at first.”
“That’s okay,” it simply said, not sounding too affected. “Is she also like you?”
“Yes, she’s a sorcerer. Listen, if I go to the entrance of this store to meet my friend, can you promise not to leave?” He knew he was gambling with their lives, but those molten honey eyes stared at his soul, reading him like an open book, and Megumi wanted to believe that eyes like that were incapable of deceit.
“I promise Megumi-nii that I will stay here!” the curse smiled cheerfully, and Megumi released a ragged breath he’d been holding.
He ran into Nobara at the entrance just as she arrived.
Her face was pink from running and she was slightly panting, eyes wide and alert above the cuts on each of her cheeks. She stared intensely at the dark room. She lifted her hammer with three nails already prepared in her other hand when Megumi quickly grabbed her wrists.
“This is weird, but uh,” Megumi’s voice trailed off, knowing that if he wasn’t careful, Nobara might end up killing the curse upon first sight. “We can’t kill it. Not yet so please, just don’t do anything rash.”
Nobara had so many questions that she could not fit them all through her mouth in one go, so she just ended up staring at Megumi with utter confusion. “Eh?”
Megumi grabbed her by the sleeve of her jacket, and he led her back to the place where the curse was obediently waiting. It was playing with the little bunny again, tiger mask in its lap.
“I found it like this. Somehow that mask concealed its energy,” Megumi quietly debriefed everything he knew before Nobara snapped back to her senses. “It can talk like a human, and it said that it doesn’t like the other curses. I don’t even know if it knows that it’s also a curse. And it also said that it doesn’t want to fight me.”
“Are you fucking insane…!” Nobara breathlessly hissed, but before she could say anything else, the curse gave her the same intense glaring treatment that it gave Megumi, and Nobara’s breath got stuck in her throat.
Then the curse’s eyes opened up impossibly wide, looking at the girl with unashamed wonder.
“Wow, so pretty,” it whispered, and Nobara’s posture noticeably changed. The curse smiled up at her, the thin wrinkles in the corner of its eyes making it appear so human. “Hello,” it chimed. “Are you Megumi-nii’s friend?”
Nobara needed a second before she was certain that she could answer.
“We’re not friends, this idiot is my classmate,” she blurted out in her typical confident manner, and Megumi saw that maniac sparkle in her eyes light up that only appeared when she was using her hammer.
“What’s your name then?”
“I’m Kugisaki Nobara.”
The curse listened intensely like it was trying to digest her words and the truth behind them. It looked skeptical for only a moment before its face became unreadable.
“Nobara-san, nice to meet you! I would introduce myself too, but I don’t have a name yet. What’s the other one called?”
The two sorcerers shared an incredulous look.
Even if it’s not aware of its own cursed energy, Megumi thought, it got an accurate reading of the difference between Nobara’s and Sukuna’s souls. Even distinguished sorcerers mistook her energy for Sukuna’s at first glance.
Nobara harshly grabbed Megumi by the arm and yanked him around.
“Okay,” she inhaled deeply and took a second before breathing out. “Fucking pretty privilege. I kind of understand now.”
“It could be lying, but we should tell Gojo-sensei. Jujutsu regulations demand it to be exorcised, but…” Megumi’s voice trailed off and looked at the curse over his shoulder. It once again distracted itself with the bunny.
They could not keep their eyes off it for long. It was an absurd sight, perhaps because it was so wholesome and looking so non-life-threatening. But Megumi knew better, so he summoned Shiroi and ordered him to watch the curse.
When it saw the dog, it let out a cute little gasp and threw itself on the shikigami.
“Doggy!” it giggled and tightly hung onto the confused dog’s fur.
“Do you think it’s some kind of mutant?” Nobara whispered. “A mutant curse. Do curses go through evolution?”
“I don’t know. Leaving it alive is dangerous, but what if it’s something important? I want to hear what Gojo has to say about it.”
“Right.” They needed service for that. “Isn’t the veil weaker in the middle? Because barriers focus more energy on the edges? Maybe there’s service in the lobby.”
Megumi raised a brow. “Who would’ve guessed you were paying attention in class? I thought you go there to sleep.”
“Zip it, smartass! I pay attention all the time!” Nobara exclaimed and crossed her arms in front of her chest. “More than you, anyway. Number one sorcerer rule is don’t leave any of them alive no matter how cute.”
“Whatever, keep an eye on it, will you? I’ll find service,” Megumi deadpanned. “And don’t do anything stupid, okay?”
Nobara scoffed. “Who do you think I am? I’m not an idiot.”
“You did eat Sukuna’s finger.”
“Fair enough,” Nobara frowned and sat down next to the curse while Megumi hurried downstairs.
Holding his phone up, he slowly made his way to the lobby, which he guessed was the center of the building, and walked around in circles in the hope of seeing a single bar show up in the top right corner of the screen. But, as expected, there was no signal.
“Shit,” he gritted his teeth, weighing their options. They were not getting out while that curse was still alive, the veil wouldn’t go down. They could wait until their absence was noticed by the outsiders, but who knows how much time had to pass until that happened. A lot of time, possibly, and a lot of time meant a lot of opportunities for their seemingly innocent curse to reveal its true nature and kill them both.
He stepped up onto the edge of the fountain, holding the phone high up, when for a snippet of a second a tiny bar showed up before disappearing. Slowly moving the phone around to find it again, Megumi swayed around like a drunkard on the ledge of the fountain but he could not find it again.
“Come on,” he mumbled encouragingly when he spotted a trashcan not too far from where he fought for balance. He lifted one leg, wanting to climb onto the trashcan to get a little higher, but when one of his feet was on the edge of the metal box, and the other was still on the fountain ledge, the single bar lit up on his phone again, and he immediately froze.
The position was more than uncomfortable, and Megumi cursed his stars which led him to this situation. Holding the phone above his head in the near full split he quickly dialed Gojo’s number and put him on speaker.
♡♡♡
Meanwhile, Nobara was tapping away his fingers on her crossed arms impatiently.
The child curse was still pampering the demon dog, and Nobara had never related to a dog as much as this before. Hearing Shiroi’s confused whines she sighed, and mumbled, “I know, girl, I’m just as confused.”
“Oi,” she spoke up louder, attracting the attention of the curse. “Leave the mutt alone.”
“Can you understand what she says?” it asked.
“No, stupid, it’s a dog… or whatever. But this is weird,” she said with furrowed brows, ready to strike down with the hammer at any sudden movement the curse made. “So, spill, what’s your deal? You can charm Fushiguro with your looks, but I’m not that weak.”
The curse stroked Shiroi’s head again and buried its face in the soft fur. “You don’t look weak. You look very strong, Nobara-san.”
Nobara scoffed, trying her hardest not to show that maybe just a little she was impressed with the curse’s observation skills. “Quit the bullshit or I’ll exorcise you right now. Answer my question.”
It looked up and gave Nobara a stare that made her whole body shiver. It wasn’t threatening like the death glare that she and Megumi exchanged on the daily. Rather it was innocent and so open. Nobara could feel Sukuna starting to shift and fidget uncomfortably in the guts of her soul under the eyes of the curse. She forced him to stay put, ignoring the death threats she got in return.
“Why are you staring at me?” Nobara barked, trying to hide her discomfort.
“You have a lot of hate inside you,” the curse said, his voice quiet and eerily calm. “But it’s not yours. What’s his name?”
“What is with you and wanting to know everyone’s name?” Nobara bickered.
The curse shrugged its thin shoulders. “I want to know many people, so when I die, I won’t be alone.”
Nobara pouted her lips and suddenly couldn’t fight the urge to look away.
She sat on the floor a few feet away from the curse and picked up the abandoned bunny plushie.
“Are you afraid of death?” she asked suddenly.
“I don’t know, I’ve never died before. But… I saw Grandpa die.”
“What do you mean grandpa?”
“Well, my grandpa,” the curse said with a wrinkle on its forehead like it just remembered something. “He lived in the hospital.”
“Was he also a curse?”
“A what?”
“A curse. You’re a curse. Don’t you know that?”
Pink eyebrows furrowed a little. “Grandpa called me ‘grandson’. But maybe I’m a ‘curse’ too.”
Nobara hummed. Grandson, huh? Was it a he, then?
And regarding the mysterious grandfather, curses did manifest a lot more often in hospitals due to the sorrow and pain that weighed down the atmosphere, so maybe a dying person could have seen this curse and mistook it for a real person.
♡♡♡
The line rang three times before it was picked up.
“Hellooo~” came the obnoxiously happy voice from the other end of the line. “Megumi-chan, done with the mission already?”
“Not exactly,” Megumi grumbled, trying his best to balance in the uncomfortable position with the phone above his head. His thighs were burning and small beads of sweat collected on his temple. “We…” Uh, he hated this. “Kind of ran into some complications.”
“Oh? What happened? Is Kugisaki alright? You sound a little exhausted.”
Yes, that’s because I’m balancing my weight in an almost split, but I would never tell you that, because you would tease me about it for the rest of my life, you annoying–
“She’s fine. But we can’t get the veil down.”
He heard Gojo chuckle. “Do I really need to tell you how veils work? They stay up until–”
“Can you just come here?” Megumi interrupted, starting to feel uneasy about leaving Nobara alone with that curse for too long. “We can show you the rest in person. It’s kinda hard to explain.”
There was a short pause, before Gojo said a carefree little “okay,” and hung up.
Megumi rushed back to the store, where Nobara was sitting on the ground safe and sound, playing with a few more dolls they found.
“Gojo-sensei is coming,” he quickly said, and Nobara whipped her head towards him.
“Did you say that mask was what disguised his energy?”
“Yeah. We should probably put it back on, right? Just in case. You’ve got a lot, you know,” he then turned to the curse, who was observing them with the most innocent, doggy-eyed expression known to mankind.
“A lot of what?” he asked.
Megumi let out a sigh and snatched the mask from the ground.
“Here, put this back on,” he said, and the curse did as he was told without asking questions. “Our teacher is coming here to help us. He will tell us what to do with you.”
“Fushiguro!” Nobara hissed at the boy under her breath. “Don’t talk like that! He will get spooked!”
“He?” Megumi raised a brow. “It’s a curse.”
“Yeah, but you will scare him away! You can’t just tell him that sensei will decide if he will–” her voice trailed off and taking a careful glance at the curse, now his energy covered up by the mask, she whispered, “If sensei will kill him!”
Megumi rolled his eyes but said nothing. Then he turned to the curse. “Oi, um… Taiga-kun! Come on!”
The curse lifted his head with a tiny gasp and gawped at Megumi with wide eyes behind the mask. “Do you mean me?”
“Yeah, come on!”
The curse jumped from the floor frighteningly quickly, and he was clinging onto Megumi’s shoulders before any of them could say a single word. It was scary how outpowered they were against this weird little thing.
“Megumi-nii gave me a name!” the curse hiccupped, his cold skin touching the nape of Megumi’s neck, making him shiver.
Glancing nervously at Nobara, Megumi slowly unwrapped the ice-cold arms from around his neck.
“Let’s go, okay? Our teacher will be here soon.” You have to make a good impression, he wanted to say but he shut his mouth at the last second before the words slipped from his tongue.
“Is he going to help me find my grandpa?” the curse asked while worming his little hand in Megumi’s, and the two sorcerers exchanged looks.
Nobara shrugged and glided a finger across her neck with her tongue sticking out of her mouth. Whether that meant that the aforementioned grandpa had died or that they would very soon when Gojo found out what they’d got themselves into, Megumi couldn’t tell.
Gojo warped right into the middle of the lobby, a good fifteen meters away from his students.
Seeing the unpredictable sorcerer floating mid-air with his hands in his pockets, and eyes hidden behind the blindfold, Megumi couldn’t help tightening his hold on the curse’s hand, even when the cold began pricking his skin. He knew that Gojo wouldn’t make a huge deal about how dangerous and careless they were, after all his reaction to Nobara eating the finger of the King of Curses was ‘wow, that’s hilarious.’
However, Megumi knew just how cruel and unsympathetic his guardian could be at times under the thick layers of sugar and playful affection. He… didn’t want Taiga-kun to be in the point of aim of that cruelty.
When the man turned around to face them, his gleeful expression didn’t change one bit. No doubt he knew what Taiga-kun was; nothing could fool his eyes, even when closed.
Megumi heard the curse’s breath hitch audibly when he saw the tall sorcerer, but he kept walking next to Megumi, not letting go of his hand for a second. The tiny bells were jingling idly on the sides of his mask.
“Sooo~ What’s the situation that needs the best sensei in the universe to come to the rescue?”
♡♡♡
Satoru felt nauseous the moment he felt that thing in his line of vision.
His other senses told him that it was human on the surface, but from the depths of his Six Eyes came a whisper to his ears, telling him that there was a suffocating amount of cursed energy hidden in that body. The impossible contrast, the constant flickering of energy made his stomach turn, and it left him feeling a little sick to his stomach.
What kind of a weird pet did Megumi-chan find again? he wondered. He wasn’t too worried about their proximity. A flick of his index finger would have the little beast turning into purple vapor. Though Satoru did chuckle at the boy’s defensive posture, the way he slightly pulled the masked curse behind his back.
“This will be interesting,” he mused to himself, stroking his chin. “If it isn’t my two favorite students!” he raised his voice with a wide grin to address them.
“Ugh, don’t call me your favorite if you never prove it with a gift card,” Nobara gritted her teeth and rolled her eyes, looking like she was ready to knit a sweater out of her sensei’s vocal cords.
“So materialistic, I feel unloved, unseen, used for my wealth and good looks. Aaand~” Satoru tilted his head, looking at the curse, elongating the word to fuel his passion for drama, “what do we have here?”
Megumi looked at the curse, who tilted his head upwards to meet the boy’s eyes. Satoru intensely watched the interaction, information flooding his closed eyes.
Megumi nodded towards Satoru, letting go of the curse’s cold hand as if to encourage him to step up.
“Go on,” he spoke softly.
The curse then looked at Satoru, and as if knowing that he was facing someone powerful enough to rip reality apart on a whim, his movements were visibly measured, like he was walking on glass. He slid a finger under the chin of the mask, and slowly lifted it, instantly filling the air with burning, blinding cursed energy. Satoru’s shoulders went stern, but even if the power of the curse surprised him, he knew it was no match.
“Hello,” the curse spoke up nervously in a sweet tone, staring at the man with honeyed eyes. “My name is Taiga-kun! Megumi-nii named me.”
Gojo Satoru stood motionless for a moment before he lifted his blindfold, revealing a pair of piercing blue eyes.
“Megumi did?” he asked, his voice tinted with amusement that hid deeper, more serious intentions. Then his half-smile froze on his face, and his eyes went wide.
For seconds that felt like an eternity, the strongest sorcerer and the child curse were looking each other in the eye. The moment those golden-rimmed pupils focused on him, bolts of electricity raced through his body.
The curse was undoubtedly beautiful, stunning even; his eyes were radiant, stripping Satoru of all his pretenses and secrets, but what struck the man more was just how deep those eyes saw. He felt his soul opened up layer by layer, and there was no stopping it. Like an arrowhead that was wedging itself deeper and deeper into his flesh, it kept on reaching. It was like the curse touched him, like he somehow got through Satoru’s Infinity, and there was only one time he had felt more violated in his life.
Then as if just to mess with his mind, the curse opened his plush lips and spoke in a dreamy, distant voice. “What’s his name?”
Satoru glared at him, now not even trying to hide his disbelief anymore.
He completely forgot about the world around him, and all he could see was a pair of pitch-black eyes reflecting in the golden ones. For the first time Gojo Satoru was on the receiving end of being taken apart piece by piece by someone else, and he sure didn’t appreciate it.
He forcefully tore his gaze away from the curse, the pressure on his body immediately lifting.
“I still don’t know what this is,” he grunted. His students, who watched the silent scene with stern expressions, flinched under his intense focus. Satoru’s words came out more harshly than he meant them to be.
Megumi was the one brave enough to speak first. “He’s a curse, but we don’t want to kill him.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because he’s different,” the boy clarified a little impatiently like it was the most natural thing for a sorcerer to want a cursed pet.
“Megumi-kun,” Satoru attempted to laugh it off, but it sounded forced. “That’s what every girl says about themselves, but they’re all the same, scary monsters.”
“Oi, you sexist fuck!” Nobara yelled with a finger pointing at Satoru’s head. “Say that again and I’ll sic Sukuna on you!”
“You see, this is exactly what I’m talking about.”
“Gojo sensei,” Megumi said, his tone soft and pleading, something that Satoru could not ignore. His mocking expression dropped when he saw the sincerity reflecting in emerald green eyes. “Please, do the same thing for him you did for Kugisaki! I think it’s worth giving him a chance.”
Satoru bit down on his lip while glancing at the curse again, and shivers ran down his spine once more. The ghostly eyes of the past were still staring at him, but once the initial shock was over, he could think more clearly.
“He grew on you, didn’t he?” he mused.
“Yes,” Megumi blurted out without a second thought. “Please do something about it.”
“How could I ever refuse the wish of one of my precious students?” Satoru let out a breathy laugh, this time genuinely, and shot a wink at them. “Leave it to me, my dears, Gojo-sensei will take care of everything!”
Megumi let out a sigh that he had been holding since the time Gojo had arrived.
The man led them to the edge of the domain, and with a single swipe of a finger, he quickly dissolved it into nothing. Then Megumi lifted a hand towards the curse, who put the mask on again under Gojo sensei’s instructions.
The curse looked at Megumi’s hand, and he saw uneasiness through the eyes holes on the mask.
“What’s wrong?” Megumi asked, halting both Nobara and Gojo on their way out.
“Where are we going?” the curse’s voice was trembling.
“To a place where it’s safe.”
“But will Grandpa be able to find me there?” He looked so small, so lost, the sight of him making Megumi want to hold him tight, never mind the uncomfortable coldness of his skin. “I’ve never been away from him before for this long.”
“It’s okay, we will protect you,” Megumi tried consoling him, and the bright doe-eyes shining through the mask had his heart skipping a beat. It was nothing short of angelic. Twisted, eerie, and ethereal.
“Promise?” Taiga-kun whispered.
Megumi took his hand in his, and gently squeezed it as he gave him a soft smile.
“Yeah, promise.”