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Jun 22

08. [ DELIVERANCE GONE ]

CHAPTER EIGHT: ROT IN THE MARROW

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notes. WE MIGHT BE BACK BABY HELL YEAHHH. aka: reader kicks ass while gojo and geto dumb & dumber share gossip and trauma and file each others nails. yw.

"Over the last few weeks, several grade three and grade two sorcerers have failed to check in with their assigned auxiliary managers after the anticipated time of mission completion. You will investigate."

You kneel on a hard pillow, head bowed, in the dark room where every unusual assignment is allocated to you. Golden light projects shifting silhouettes on paper dividers, obscuring the faces of your superiors. Idly, you tuck your index finger beneath the hem of your sleeve, tracing the veins of your wrist with the back of your nail.

"How many in total were declared missing?" you murmur.

"Three. In particular, we noted that all missions were based in the countryside. You have not marked any of the individuals as potential traitors. Their supervisors, who each conducted a brief search for the sorcerers before reporting them missing, found no bodies. You may need to reconsider their designations."

"You suspect they've betrayed you?"

"No. We suspect nothing. It's your responsibility to prove – definitively – what happened." A shadow looms closer, plunging half the room into shadow. "This is a classified mission. A car will be readied for you shortly outside."

Your brow furrows. You glance up at the faceless shadows. "Tonight? Already? But I just returned from—"

"You will go," an elderly female voice interrupts, slow and accentuated, "tonight. If you're tired, boy, we can always task another sorcerer with this mission. I believe a special-grade is currently available."

Her words make your blood freeze. Swiftly, you bow so low your forehead brushes the hardwood floor. "No," you whisper, fingernails cutting into your palms. "I apologise for my rudeness. I can do it. Don't… please don't transfer this assignment to Gojo Satoru."

A short silence.

An impatient sigh.

"The most recent disappearance occurred in the Keihoku area, northwest of Kyoto. The attending sorcerer was grade two, sent to exorcise a local spirit thought to be spreading illnesses in a village. It's mostly full of elderly farmers. Try not to involve them – they're a nosy, superstitious lot. They'll just get in the way of our work."

You nod, drawing yourself back up to your knees. You clasp your hands in your lap and stare at the floor; there's a dark circular knot in the wood grain next to your leg. Circles, cycles, constant motion with no end.

"And if it's a grade one curse or higher?" you ask carefully.

"It won't be."

Why are they so sure of that?

One by one, every light behind the paper dividers is extinguished with whispered breaths that feel too close. You do not get a goodbye or a dismissal – just an absence of their presence. You gradually rise to your feet, standing in silence in the encompassing darkness.

This is your role. Your sole, singular purpose. You have devoted yourself to being the protector of all; that includes Satoru, even if he's supposed to protect everyone else. Especially because he protects everyone else.

A little lost sleep is nothing compared to what he endures.

—

The village in question is a tiny, almost archaic hamlet, with only enough houses for a handful of families. Rice paddies stretch into the horizon, and the evening air is humid and damp. Ash-grey fog swirls around your ankles as you step out onto the muddy main highway.

"Thank you, Tanaka-san," you say, holding the door open. "As always, give me two hours before you start worrying. Maybe you can fit in a quick nap – it's late, after all."

The man in the front of the black sedan is older, maybe forty or so, with once-gelled hair that's become loose by running his fingers through it one too many times. He's the one they assign you when you visit Kyoto. He twists in the driver's seat, blinking at you over the centre console with tired eyes.

"Tell that to the bosses," he sighs. "Need a report refresher? I've got the file right, uh… here." He fumbles in the passenger's seat, picking out a manila folder amongst a pile of identical ones. He lifts it. "Found it."

You smile and shake your head. "It's okay, thank you. I have a good memory. Get some rest, sir."

He shrugs. "Suit yourself. But hey, kid…"

You pause, inching the door open again and peeking in. "Yes?"

He glances out the window, his mouth a thin line as he stares out at the foggy rice fields. He rubs a hand over the stubble of his jaw with a silent exhale. "Just watch yourself out there, alright? This place gives me the creeps."

"Of course. I always do." You close the door as he reclines his seat back and settles in for a cramped nap in the car. Technically against the rules, but you're no snitch, and Tanaka sleeps lightly so you don't have to worry much about him getting jumped.

You step away from the car, and it takes all of ten steps before glancing back yields nothing but a dark, vaguely car-shaped shadow in the fog. You pull out a small pocket torch and click it on, casting a warm yellow beam of light along the path in front of you. You swing it around, observing your surroundings as you walk, holding it by your shoulder in a pose that feels as if it isn't fully your own.

"No, no, hold it like this," Satoru corrects, grabbing your hand to shift it from waist-height to shoulder-height. "There – that's way better. Detectives and cool guys hold it up. Horror protagonists hold it down. If you break all the rules of a horror movie, you'll never feel scared."

You grip the torch tighter.

You pass the first of many buildings. It's deathly quiet. The roads in the town are tight, with tiny branching alleys littered with stairs to accommodate the hilly terrain. Corrugated iron sheds, homes on stilts – the place is nothing like your home in the mountains, even though they're both about the same distance from a major city. This feels like it's trapped about thirty years in the past.

The mud splashes beneath black boots as you pass through a puddle. You begin to knock gently on doors, and water gathers in the corners of porches and awnings. The downpour of rain was recent, only stopping just before you arrived.

Half of the houses are dark. You pass by those without pausing, wondering if they sit empty. Behind some doors, you hear low murmurs and shuffling movements, which all still the instant your boots creak on the house steps or your knuckles hit the door.

"Namu amida butsu," you call gently, because you doubt you'll get any bites if you simply stay silent in a frightened town or go around chanting sutras to alert them of your presence like beggar monks do. Non-traditional, but sorcery isn't exactly normal, either. "Do you know where I can find the village headman?"

What sort of monk wanders around late at night asking for specific people? Especially after a hard rain… The higher-ups certainly aren't making it easy for you. You can't even walk around with a bowl to make it look like you seek alms.

You get no response for the first house, nor for several houses after that. You don't fault them. Patiently, you go from house to house, down each road and alley, until – at last – something catches.

The front door squeaks open, and a sliver of an old man's face squints through the gap. Smoothly, you tuck the torch into your pocket and press your palms together in front of you, bowing slightly.

"Good evening," you greet. "Namu amida butsu. I hope you're well."

The old man's singular visible eye narrows further. "Well enough," he rasps shortly. "Who are you?"

You introduce yourself with your name. "I'm looking for the headman," you continue. "Do you know where I might find him?"

A grunt. "You're looking at 'im."

"Oh." Your lips part in pleasant surprise. "You're the first to have opened their door, too. What luck."

His single visible eye scrutinises you, taking in your red kesa and dark robes. "Aren't you a little young for a monk?"

"I'm not fully ordained yet," you reply truthfully, "but I was taught by my seniors to always help those willing to accept it. I heard rumours of the troubles afflicting this village, and thought I might impart some blessings upon its residents before I move on. Are you open to aid?"

He stares – glares, really – at you for a long time. You barely move, still gently smiling in that polite, compassionate way that's difficult to feign.

"All right," he grumbles, opening the door wider. Warm light scatters across the porch and down the steps. "Come in and get out of the cold. Looking at you properly, you really aren't very old, are you? And here I was, thinkin' how none of you youngsters have any respect for belief anymore."

You thank him as you step inside, removing your boots and placing them neatly by the door. He offers you a pair of guest slippers, and you accept them.

The old man, sparsely white-haired and wearing a navy woollen sweater, shuffles around, beckoning you to follow. The house is small and traditional, and he leads you to the room containing the stove and the sunken hearth, above which a kettle hangs, slowly heated. Seated by it, sewing up a pillow, a silver-haired lady looks up at his entrance – and when her eyes fall upon you, they widen in curiosity.

"Who's this young man you've picked up, dear?"

"Some monk boy," he responds gruffly, gesturing you to sit by the hearth. A contained fire burns within – a small pile of firewood rests against the corner of the square pit. It crackles in the quiet home. "Went around knocking on doors asking for me. He wants permission to bless our crops."

"Not just your crops," you add, greeting the old woman with a soft Nembutsu. She inclines her head, pressing her palms together in return. "I heard from passersby that this town has struggled with unusual illnesses, too. Perhaps I could help with that."

The old man snorts derisively as he goes to sit on her other side. "Could you, now? Perhaps if you pray hard enough, it'll save us, like some miracle."

"Honey, don't speak like that," the woman scolds him, frowning. She turns to you. "Forgive him, please. He's tired and cranky because of the storm – his bones ache more with the rain. We bear no ill will towards you."

"It's alright. I understand my presence at such a time of day is… unusual. But when I heard the extent of the difficulties here, I felt it was prudent to come as quickly as possible. Would you be willing to describe what's happened? If all goes well, I should be gone by morning."

If you didn't know better, you'd think she looks almost stricken with relief, as if it's a physical thing. She nods vigorously, clasping her rough hands together. Certainly, she has been a hard worker all her life. Her knuckles are large, her palms worn. "Yes, yes, of course! Minato-kun's little daughter has been bedridden with fevers and shakes for nearly a week. He's been beside himself with worry, coming back every few days just to check her temperature himself. He should be staying in the city for his work."

You tilt your head. "Is his daughter often sick like this?"

"No, and that is why he's so concerned. She shakes off most colds and coughs like rain off the eaves." She sighs. "She is not the only one. Most of the children are ill. They all seemed to get sick around the same time – about a week ago. Even medicine from the city does nothing."

"If modern medicine doesn't help… Hm. Do they often play in certain areas? Anywhere that may have seen things like bad injuries or other strong, negative memories?" You don't want to come out and say 'haunted places' right away. Hopefully they'll come to offer that on their own.

She pauses to think, glancing down at the needle and thread in front of her. "The rice fields in the north, perhaps? There were some… strong stories my mother used to tell me about the fields." She lowers her voice, speaking haltingly, as if the mere whisper of the words might summon them. "Bad-tempered ghosts that only come out at night. Yokai."

A strong starting point. "Are there any other strange phenomena you've noticed? Anything that happened around the time the children began to fall ill. There may be a correlation."

"Ghosts might be hurting our children?" She clasps her hands tightly, murmuring a mantra for good health. "Now, thinking of it… The crops there have struggled this past year. No other field yields so little, or of such poor quality. The air grows heavy when the sun sets. My sisters both mentioned becoming lost on the paths when the fog thickens. That shouldn't happen – they've lived here their whole lives, so they should know the way by heart."

You nod slowly. "And this all happened recently?"

"Yes. Before the children, there was the fog – and the crops. Oh, heavens. We should have called for a priest earlier. Namu amida butsu. Namu amida butsu—"

Reassuringly, you reach out and grasp her hands, her skin paper-thin and liver-spotted. You say, gently but firmly, "Don't be afraid. I will help you. But I need your help, miss – I need you to tell me about everything strange. Anything out of the ordinary."

She opens her mouth. Then, she glances at you, puzzled. "Young man, did you just call me 'miss'? I could be your grandmother."

You smile – a little cheeky, a little boyish. "Really? I couldn't tell."

She laughs, warm and affectionate. She even pinches your cheek. It worked. You can sense her worry dissolving. "Oh, you…"

Her husband sighs, though his stern eyes soften when he looks at her crescent-eyed smile. "You're too soft, Fumiko."

"Quiet. He reminds you of Minato when he was young, doesn't he?"

The old man grunts but doesn't interrupt again. The old woman, Fumiko, turns to you.

"Is a stranger's visit important?" she asks carefully. "Two days ago, a man came through, dressed in a well-pressed suit. He was polite, wore glasses, but didn't speak much. I wondered if he might be one of those real-estate or bank salarymen coming to scare us, trying to buy our lands, but the odd thing is… I never saw him again. He didn't come with a car, but when I asked around, no one else noticed him leave, either. It was as if he simply vanished."

Your gut coils uncomfortably. The attending sorcerer's file had a picture of a dark-haired man with glasses. You force your expression still, sitting back on your heels and rubbing your palms against your knees. "That is strange. I wonder where he went…"

"My sister said she saw him linger by the well. It's in the centre of town by the bathhouse. Of course, that may just be coincidental, since that's also where the noticeboard is. We hang everything up there: requests for help with chores, offering spare children's clothing, invites for some small festivities when the days come around. Perhaps he was reading them."

"Why do you mention the well?" you ask.

She sighs. "My mother told me ghost stories of soldiers being killed and buried in the rice fields or distraught widows drowning themselves in the well. Mostly they were to scare us children into behaving and not staying out after dark. However, in particular, the well has always been… strange. Sometimes, on ill-omened days, you can hear a woman wailing from it. We try not to draw from it on those days so as to not disturb her."

A well ghost. How classic. "I see. Do you have any similar stories of the rice fields?"

The old man shifts, drinking his tea. "Does it really matter?" he mutters into his cup. "It's bad luck to talk about these things so late at night. They're only old wives' tales, but..."

You incline your head. "I understand your hesitation. However, fear feeds their strength. If there truly is a ghost causing this, I need to know her story to be able to lay her to rest. Maybe there's something tethering her to this world, something she can't let go of. I might be able to resolve it."

He examines you closely, his eyes sharp and wary. "What kind of monk are you?"

"One who wants to help," you reply simply.

The fire crackles. Leaning over, Fumiko feeds another small log to it, prodding the ashes. Green sap pops in the wood.

"Surely it cannot hurt to try," she says quietly, folding her hands in her lap again. "Do you need anything in return for your help? Food, clothes?"

You shake your head quickly, lifting your hands. "The merit I gain from helping you is enough. You'd need anything you give me more than I do."

"Are you sure? We can spare a little. It helps our good karma, too."

"Making sure your family lives healthily is more important. Give nothing that would make your life harder." You shoot her a quick smile. "Do you mind telling me about the fields?"

"Ah, I suppose." She pauses to collect her thoughts. "My mother once said that when she was small and playing in the paddy fields, she was separated from her friends because of the fog. When trying to find her way back, she tripped, fell into the water, and a blue-skinned corpse wearing a soldier's uniform was staring up at her. She told me she never ran faster than that day. I know a few others in town with similar experiences – I can bring you to them, if you need it."

"That's alright – it's quite late and I don't want to disturb anyone more than I already have. I'll take a look around." You move to stand. "Thank you very much for speaking to me – auntie, uncle. I'll do whatever I can to help you."

"What happened to 'miss'?" she asks playfully, following you to the door. Before you go, she reaches up and pets your hair – you stoop to make it easier for her to reach. She smiles. "Oh, you're a good boy. So respectful. Come back to my home when you're finished, alright? We'll thank you properly. You can stay for a meal – even the night, if you need it. I can't bear to think about sending you out there in the cold again when we have a perfectly good hearth to share!"

You squeeze her hands gently, still stooped to make yourself less imposing in their small, narrow home. You're probably a head and a half taller than the old woman. "You're very kind, auntie. I'll return with good news."

You leave the house armed with knowledge of local legends and a promise to keep. The chill is icy, but nothing your layers can't fend off, especially if you'll be running around chasing curses soon. If nothing else, it gets the blood pumping.

You wander past a playground, a general store, and a bathhouse. None of them contains residues of cursed energy that might guide you to some sort of den or origin. Often curses choose dark corners to nest in, and storerooms or attics are common areas for it since they're often undisturbed. You peek into a butcher's with cured meat hanging in the windows, but relax when you notice only a single grade three curse quivering under the counter. You give chase when it squeals and tries to run, snatching it up like a misbehaving cat before exorcising it. Spreading sickness like this, across multiple individuals and lingering even as they move from the original location, would leave far stronger traces than this thing is capable of.

You pull your phone out of your pocket. Your thumb has memorised the path to a certain friend's name. Adding even one more contact would royally mess things up.

He picks up after two rings. "You're in some serious trouble, angel. You said you'd be back in an hour."

"Hello to you, too, Satoru," you greet. "I know, and I'm sorry. I went straight from the meeting to Kyoto. Couldn't talk on the train."

You didn't really want to speak in the car, either. You hold nothing against Tanaka – it's just that you don't enjoy the idea of the higher-ups receiving news of your long-range interactions with Satoru. For all you know, they might go full Luddite on you and ban you from using personal phones at all, even if it's the most efficient way of carrying and moving information around.

"You have some real nerve, sounding so… so… ugh! I hate that I'm already forgiving you right now," he complains. "Whatever. You said you're in Kyoto? That's so far. When are you coming back?"

"I'm not sure. Late tonight, likely."

"How late?"

"Too late for you to stay up and wait," you say knowingly, smiling as you hear him huff on the other side. Fabric rustles near the microphone. "Are you in bed? Remember to move around every so often if you're playing video games. You have terrible posture already."

"Everyone's posture is terrible compared to yours. And I'm lying down – so if I get a sore back, it's actually the school's fault for giving us shitty mattresses, not mine." He moves again. "I can't believe they sent you out on another mission so quickly. I was hoping they'd ask for one of your 'internal reviews' or something. At least for those you're allowed to sleep at a normal time."

"I know. But don't worry about me. I messaged Ieri about an hour ago regarding your medical check-up – it seems I will have to rely on her this time. Don't worry, I only asked for one," you say quickly as he sucks in a breath to protest. "I've asked her to check for foreign cursed energy remnants. That curse user's shikigami used poison a few times, so I just want to make sure nothing's lingered that might ruin my hard work."

"Eh? But the snake didn't splash me. I'm fine."

"Sure, the snake didn't. But the tiger I fought spat venom, and the vulture's talons were coated in it. I caught a stray hit – it felt like rot and lingered until every trace was gone. It sort of... chewed through my freshly-regenerated flesh until I realised I had to expel it before I could properly heal, like a splinter. Even something as small as a nick – something you could miss in the heat of the moment – could spell trouble."

"Ah, angel, you're so paranoid. My Six Eyes woulda told me if anything icky touched me. Also, you know, the pain of being melted... But fine, fine – I'll go see the doc tomorrow. Just so you can rest easy."

"Thank you, Satoru. That means a lot."

"Mhm, you're very welcome."

You pause for a moment, just in case he wants to keep talking, but he doesn't. You hum. "Usually you'd have squeezed me for a drink or some snacks by now. What changed?"

"Nothing! Geez, so sceptical all the time. I just thought I'd let you keep your money for a bit. You can buy me something later if you want, though," he says smugly. "I wouldn't turn down a Ramune."

You chuckle softly, and on the other side, Satoru stops moving entirely, even holding his breath, just to hear the tinny echo of your laugh. His heart does something weird.

"I'll come back tonight," you promise. "Melon flavour?"

"Mhm! You know it."

"Alright, noted," you say lightly. "Take care of our kid until I come back."

"We have to come up with a really good, strong name for him soon. Brainstorm some while you're out slaving away as a corporate cog, m'kay?" You can hear the pout in his voice. "As for our second-born… I dunno. We can call it Meatball or something. Fish Cake. Cabbage."

"Are you hungry? Again? Didn't we eat just now?"

He snorts. "Penne alla Vodka."

"Too long. Doesn't roll off the tongue."

Satoru sighs, slightly muffled. Perhaps he's buried his face in his pillow. "Yeah, you're right, needta workshop it. And now I'm hungry…"

You sweep your torch across the facades of buildings, their windows dark and their shadows deep. The wind sends a chill through you, and you rub your arm absent-mindedly. "Go eat something light, Satoru. I think I left some rice crackers in the commons' kitchen – I bought barbecue-flavoured ones in case you got peckish. You can open it, if you want."

"For me?" His voice is soft, sweet. "Angel, you're the best. So thoughtful."

"It's nothing." The grey fog thickens as you travel further north, towards the mountains you know are there but cannot see – your torchlight pierces the mist, but it's ineffective at illuminating anything except what's directly in front of you.

Your eyes narrow. That's not how a torch works – or light itself, even. It's unnatural.

You tilt your head towards the phone, keeping your voice light. "I have to go now, 'Toru, but don't go to bed hungry, alright? It's not good for you. Take care of yourself."

"I know, I know. Ugh, wish we could chat longer," he sighs, reluctant. "Promise we'll talk later, angel?"

"Of course. Talk later."

You hang up and slip the phone away. Glancing up at the dark sky, you exhale slowly, steeling yourself. It is cold, and grey, and looks like something out of a horror game. The cold of the mist pierces your clothes, dampness gathering in the folds and hems when you walk.

You are alone again.

Your boots crunch on muddy gravel as you traipse through the town. The well comes into view between two buildings – you wander over, trailing your fingers over the worn stone and wood frame. It's sturdy, well-built, and you clip the torch to your belt as you reach for the winch on the side. The handle is worn smooth with use. With your other hand, you grab the bucket sitting on the edge of the well and toss it down, listening out for the splash as it hits the water and sinks below.

You begin to winch the bucket back up. You get half a rotation in until it stops dead, the rope cord pulling taut.

Did it catch on something? You dip the bucket back down, giving the rope a slight shake to check if it's still lodged in place. You can feel the bucket sway on the other end, and you return to the winch.

Another half a rotation before the bucket thuds dully. Your brow furrows as you reach out and tug on the rope.

This time, something feels wrong. The weight on the other end feels far too heavy to be filled with water.

You keep winding it up, and up, and your instincts scream.

"Emerge from darkness, blacker than darkness," you recite in a murmur, and a black dome drips from the sky, encasing the area securely. Your nerves are cold and focussed. "Purify that which is impure."

With one last rotation, the rope snaps – except the cut is clean, as if with a knife. The bucket splashes distantly below.

A slender, pale arm reaches over the edge of the well, bony fingers tipped with black nails as long as daggers. A second arm claws deep marks into the stone. Your mouth gives an involuntary twitch of disgust as a third arm, blackened with rot and bubbling with leaking pustules, appears, bigger and meaner than the other two.

Thankfully, that's the end of the arms. The broken, corpse-pale figure of a woman scuttles out of the well, wearing a veil draped over her face. Rags of a dress trail through the mud as she brandishes her claws and steps closer.

Visible through a tear in the veil, her pale, cracked lips part, too many teeth too sharp for anything human. Her veins are visible, green-blue under her skin. "My love… came back… for me."

You arch a brow. "You can speak?" This may be a higher grade-two curse, then, perhaps more. It'd explain the death of the sorcerer who came before.

The spirit isn't much larger than a human woman – slightly taller than average, perhaps, but there are little things about her that aren't quite right. Hands too large, neck too long. That clues you into its true nature – well, plus the freaky third arm, bloated and twitchy as it is. It extends out of the back of her shoulder.

"Give me... your… heart!" she shrieks. She lunges like an animal for your chest and you dodge cleanly backwards, narrowing your eyes as her pale hands form a simple, unpolished hand sign. The rotted arm slices and swings repeatedly at you, keeping you at bay so she can complete her hand sign. Her cursed energy flares, stronger now, and she drops her hands.

With a motion like a whip, ribbons of cursed energy explode towards you, their edges as sharp as knives. You slam a foot down and scoop your arm up in front of you, clenching a fist as if pulling something up from the earth itself. The ribbons slam into the silvery shield of your cursed energy with a clang like steel on steel, burning brightly into nothingness.

"Should've brought my sword," you sigh, lowering your arm and shaking out your hand. "This isn't fair. You have more arms than I do."

Rolling your shoulders, you trace a half circle in the gravelly mud with your foot, breathing in deeply. You settle your heart and unsheathe your tanto with a click, pushing down that flicker of annoyance.

"I'll make do." You exhale sharply. "Well, come on, miss – hit me with everything you've got."

—

"Suguru."

Silence.

"Suguru. Suguru. Suguru. Suguru—"

He rips off his headphones with a groan, head whipping in his direction. "What? What is it now?"

Satoru stands in the doorway to his bedroom, one hand on the door handle. He's wearing a loose shirt and basketball shorts, plus a pair of slides. "Play video games with me."

"No." He shoves his headphones back on and turns back to his class notes, lifting his coloured pen to draw diagrams of fatty acid chains into his notes.

Satoru doesn't move. "Suguru. Suguru."

He turns up his music's volume music with several button rapid presses.

Pouting, Satoru shuffles into the room uninvited; he leaves his slides at the door. He peers over Suguru's shoulder and, after a second of observation, points at his newest diagram. "You labelled them wrong. This one's trans-fat. That one's cis."

Wordlessly, Suguru paints over the nested titles with white-out and writes the correct names for each.

"Suguru. I know you can hear me. Suguru, play Tekken with me. I'm bored."

When he receives no response, Satoru lets out a long-suffering sigh and collapses into a purple bean bag in the corner of Suguru's room, positioned near the shelves of books. The top few rows are all academic textbooks and some old library tomes on sorcery techniques and geopolitical history, and the bottom ones are a collection of fiction and non-fiction. There is a single standalone horror manga, and no more.

Satoru blows a raspberry, slumping backwards as he pushes the books back onto the shelves. "Too many words. My eyes are tired."

Rolling his eyes, Suguru turns in his chair, draping an arm over the backrest. He shifts one side of his headphones off his ear, revealing his gauges. "Did I say you could touch my stuff?"

"You didn't say I couldn't."

"I don't want an emo in my room. You're contaminating the air in here."

Satoru rolls over, splaying over the bean bag with a rustle of fabric, and mumbles, "I'm not an emo… I am in complete control of my feelings."

"And I'm the Queen of England. Dude, you're moping like crazy. If you're looking for support, you're not gonna find it in me."

Satoru stares out of the window, the blinds not pulled all the way down. Rain patters against the glass, soft and constant. He folds his arms over the edge of the bean bag and props his chin on them, nudging his dark glasses further up his nose.

At his silence, Suguru glances back at him, his mouth forming a small, exasperated line. He pulls his headphones down around his neck and turns in his chair again. "Wow. You are seriously emo right now. Who are you and what did you do with Gojo?"

The use of his last name makes him click his tongue. He pushes his cheek into the corner of his arm. "Shut up. 'M bored. And sleepy."

"Then go to bed, dumbass."

"Can't. Not yet." He stretches his legs out. "Your room is so warm, did you know that? You're probably single-handedly running up our electricity bill into the thousands. I wasn't even that tired before I came in."

"Before you broke in, you mean. And I run cold, so I need the heater on." He stretches his arms over his head – his black hoodie has a design on the back and writing down the sleeves, all printed in radioactive-green. "Also, I'm not a huge fan of fighting games."

Satoru grabs a plushie resting on one of the shelves, pinching it by its arms and making it dance on his knees. "Boo, you killjoy, bet you're bad at them. Watch a movie with me, then. Shoko's room is the biggest, so we'll go there."

"Did you even ask her first?" he sighs, rolling over on his chair and tugging the rotund penguin out of Satoru's arms. He smooths down its velvet head and sits it on his bed between his pillows. "And be careful with that – don't pull on its wings so hard. My mother got that for me."

"Mama's boy," Satoru teases, and Suguru flippantly rubs his eye with his middle finger. Satoru snorts. "Rude. So, since you don't wanna play games with me and don't wanna watch a movie, let's gossip! I've got some pretty good dirt on my clan. Wanna hear about the affairs or our beef with the Zen'in clan?"

"I'm busy."

"Oh, c'mon, you're just making your notes all pretty. You can do that tomorrow." Satoru grins and settles deeper into the bean bag, throwing one leg over the other. "Ooh, you need to hear the story about the time my clan tried to marry me off to this Kamo girl! It's a good one."

He shifts comfortably, taking on a mysterious voice, as if he's telling ghost stories. "So, I was probably, eh, ten-ish when it happened. They were like, 'hey, you're gonna marry this girl when you grow up, but don't worry, we chose a pretty one so it's more palatable' and I was like, 'fuck you, I don't want to marry that girl, or any girl for that manner, 'cause I'm too busy doing all your jobs and exorcising these curses as a freaking ten-year-old' and then they locked me in my room for two days straight while they organised our meeting. Like seriously, I was locked-up locked up. They brought meals to my door and everything."

Suguru's face scrunches up. He pulls his headphones down around his neck fully as he turns around in his chair. "Shut up. Arranged marriages? In this day and age?"

He laughs, crossing his arms smugly. "Ha, I knew you'd wanna hear this one!"

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. Your family wanted to sell you off like cattle?"

"Yep! I was supposed to marry someone on my sixteenth birthday. I overheard them talking about making kids as quickly as possible, so – pop 'em out at eighteen. Apparently, the Kamo clan was in a bit of an inherited-technique slump, so they were desperate for heirs. As it stood, I was their best bet."

"Oh, gross. That's young. Why you specifically?"

"'Cause of my funky Eyes," he smirks, wiggling his fingers mystically. "Only one person with them can exist at any point in time, and Limitless is rare on its own – it meant there would be a higher likelihood of my kids having Blood Manipulation. Plus, I came with all the benefits of my clan name. Political goldmine."

Suguru tilts his head. "How'd you wriggle out of that? Scream loud enough? Throw enough tantrums?"

"Even better!" Satoru throws his head back and laughs brightly, eyes crinkling. "Oh, man, you won't believe this one. Guess."

"Don't want to."

"Guess."

"Oh my god, just tell me."

He sticks out his tongue. "You're no fun at all! Fine. YN saved me."

He blinks. The corner of his mouth twitches in confusion. "Explain."

Satoru grins and rocks to his feet, skipping across the room and flopping onto the bed, closer to Suguru. He kicks his feet up behind him, lying on his stomach. One hand gestures wildly. "You know how his clan's a bunch of executioners, right? They make a whole ceremony out of it when clans are involved, normally. So, being their most promising disciple, he went with them a bunch, and at this point in time, we were already friends. So he follows along to this execution for my clan, goes, 'hey, where's Satoru?' and slips away during the initial meeting. Then he finds me in my room, with a lock on my window and a bunch of jail-cell bars keeping it from opening. Literally – they installed it just for those few days until my engagement."

Suguru leans forward, intrigued despite himself. He tucks his arms over the back of his chair, sitting on it sideways. His eyes are wide, fascinated – it must sound ridiculous to someone part of normal, modern society, Satoru thinks. This is like something straight out of a tragic historical fantasy novel.

He continues, grinning, "So I must've been screaming and wailing something fierce, because I suddenly hear his voice beyond my window saying my name, all confused! My window's the traditional type that's just latticed panels you have to push open, mind you, so I probably sounded like a banshee he couldn't see. I remember being in total hysterics. I was all, 'they're making me marry a girl, angel, they want me to marry a girl!' and he was like, 'what do you mean? Why is your window locked?' and I said something like, 'they want to use me!' except I think I was crying way more than talking. Anyway, next thing I remember is that lock fucking exploding and my window getting blasted open. Then he reached in, grabbed my hand, and kidnapped me to his temple until my clan promised they would dissolve the engagement!"

"If he could break the lock, why couldn’t you?" Suguru asks. "Sounds like someone was a little dumb."

"Hey," he protests, pouting. "It was traumatic! It slipped my mind! My life was being thrown around for political gain and I felt like helpless gutter trash. I tried to break down my door, but I couldn't focus long enough to charge up Blue. Even if I did make it out – honestly, what would I change?"

Satoru sighs, flopping onto his back. He tucks his arm beneath his head, staring with a faint smile at the ceiling fan above. "That was the first and only time I've ever visited his home. It was nice. They fed me stir-fried vegetables. When my clan came for me, they were armed. Katanas and shit for intimidation. But the monks said even if they were unarmed, they wouldn't let them in because they couldn't, in good conscience, let them force me into something even they saw as archaic. And you know something's gotta be wrong if they think it is."

He giggles, slightly giddy at the memory. "I was super dumb, thinking back now. I kept saying it was a mini sleepover. YN was way more stressed than I was, always fussing, making sure I was okay. I get it more now – his philosophy is all about independence, avoiding worldly attachments, removing obstacles to enlightenment... but most of all, about reducing suffering. Crying so hard I nearly threw up really worked in my favour there. That's why he walked me to the safest place he knew, leading me by the hand every step of the god damn way."

A long pause.

"Holy shit," Suguru murmurs. "Dude. Your life is like a drama."

"I know! So," he wriggles around, getting more comfortable, "now that I have your attention, what hot goss do you have? Any childhood stories?"

"I'm boring compared to you," he mumbles, rubbing the back of his head. "I mean... I once accidentally caused a schoolyard brawl? Does that count?"

"Yeah, you are pretty boring," he agrees, making Suguru scowl, "but go ahead. Spill."

"You – whatever. So these two girls, who were best friends, got into a fight because they both liked me and one of them confessed. Then a boy got involved, too. There was a lot of hair-pulling and tears. Teachers got involved, someone got sent to the hospital, it was a whole ordeal."

Satoru's mouth falls open. "Over you? But you look – you look—"

"Rude. I was the tallest kid in my grade, and I didn't get acne. Naturally that made me the most eligible bachelor. The worst thing about my appearance was the fact that my trousers were several inches too short for half the year because I shot up like a beanstalk."

"Uh-huh. What else happened in the fight? You said they were friends – did they scream 'I trusted you!' or anything?"

Suguru ponders the question. "I don't think so, no."

Silence fills the space between them.

Satoru breaks it by rolling his eyes and flopping over. "Oh my god, you're such a shit storyteller. C'mon! Gimme the juicy bits! How'd she confess, who won the fight, did you know they were all crushing on you before or was this all new? What did you do after? Did you like them? Ugh, this is like pulling teeth."

"Look, not everyone's a professional blabbermouth!" he huffs. "She confessed in the cafeteria at lunch, I don't remember, I only knew one liked me beforehand, I don't remember, no. There. Answered."

Satoru sticks his tongue out at him, and Suguru does it back. "You're a real wet blanket. And you're immature."

"You started it!"

"No, I didn't!"

Buried in his pocket, Satoru's phone rings a jaunty tune. At the first few notes, his face lights up. He scrambles to sit up and press it to his ear. His smile is brighter than anything he's given Suguru all night.

"You're in some serious trouble, angel. You said you'd be back in an hour," he complains with a pout, grabbing Suguru's desk clock and angling it towards him to check the time. Suguru leans forward and yanks it out of his hand, setting it firmly back into place, and turns back to his homework.

"Hello to you, too, Satoru." Even through the crappy speaker, your voice manages to carry that familiar warmth that tingles up Satoru's spine and settles comfortingly around his shoulders. It's as if you're with him now, shoulder-to-shoulder and thigh-to-thigh – your proper, rightful place in the world, in his opinion. You belong right there, and nowhere else could ever measure close. "I know, and I'm sorry. I went straight from the meeting to Kyoto. Couldn't talk on the train."

At your words, however, his lip curls and a heavy feeling settles in his stomach. Straight from the meeting. The higher-ups pull you around as if you're a machine for a construction site – go here, go there, ownership changes hands at the intersection and now you're over there, and you're not allowed to move from there just because it's easier for everyone else. You go along with it, getting soaked in the icy overnight rain, because of course you do – perfect, loving you, somehow still gentle despite the blood they splatter carelessly on your hands.

It shouldn't be this way. You're stronger than any of these so-called experts of sorcery. If one strike can leave Satoru wheezing for breath, your fist could probably punch straight through their frail chests like wet paper.

Strength should rule. The problem has always been that without a moral backbone, power corrupts, and tradition entrenches it deeper. You could be so much more than a corpsemaker for the fat cats up top, but you're something new, something with the potential to rock the boat even if you're perfectly agreeable right now, and that makes you dangerous. So they try to keep you tired, keep you down, and hope that your ethical principles will eventually decay with apathy.

But the world doesn't work the way he thinks it should, with you and him together at the top. Reality forces you way down below him, where things like 'duty' and 'responsibility' keep you from doing what you want.

And that's the crux of it, really. Choice. You should be free to save people in your own way. Originally, if that meant working with jujutsu's elders – sure. But now – because of you, because of Satoru – it's less about principles and precepts than it is about maintaining the political status quo.

He can hear the rustle of your kesa as you walk through the backwater town that's decided it's their turn with the ghosts. Gravel mixed with mud crunches beneath your shoes.

You can choose to come home, he wants to say. You don't have to listen to them. You can get out of the rain. You can come home—

(—to me, his brain supplies, the thought shoving itself to the forefront of his mind – but it's a stupid thought, and he rips it to shreds for its audacity. He's not so arrogant as to presume he's your home, even if you are his.)

He wants to tell you all this – mostly the last part, the frankly pathetic plea about coming home – but when he opens his mouth, no sound escapes.

Probably for the best, anyway. Knowing him, tactless and without a filter, he'll probably say something ridiculous, maybe offensive, and then you'll be upset at him and won't come home at all.

Instead, he plasters on his best pouty voice, a little whiny and very casual. Casual, casual, casual. He hasn't been ruminating on society's political hierarchy, nor its seemingly personal vendetta against you and people like you, at all. "You have some real nerve, sounding so… so… ugh! I hate that I'm already forgiving you right now. Whatever. You said you're in Kyoto? That's so far…"

He picks at his shirt collar while he fills his own mouth with busy words and long sentences. It keeps the heavier thoughts from spilling out – especially in front of Suguru, who already pictured him as a quivering dog balancing a treat on its nose when it came to all things you.

He becomes visibly dimmer when you say your goodbyes. Suguru's already put his headphones back on, oblivious to Satoru's dip in mood, and he doesn't notice when Satoru takes his glasses off to stare up at the moon, mostly hidden behind thick grey clouds.

Is it corny to imagine you looking up at the same moon, thinking of him as he does of you? You always did compare him to the moon, what with his silvery hair and pale eyes and, most importantly, the fact that he tended to run cold. The moon's brighter in the winter, you once said, and smiled as you pinched his plump rosy cheeks, the most vibrant thing in the white forest behind his estate. So are you.

He closes his eyes and sighs. Whatever. You'll be back soon enough, and he has all the time in the world to fit his thoughts into real, big-boy words.

—

Breathing steadily, you methodically rewrap your forearms in your sleeves, twisting the cord and looping it around a button on the outside of the elbow. In front of you, the corpse of the 'well ghost' decays rapidly in flaking patches, blood spattering its dirty white dress. You swipe a streak of purple off your cheek with your thumb, watching as the body dissolves into the night air.

You wait until it's completely gone to turn around. A habit from your day job, you suppose. A person isn't a corpse until you see the body, and a battle isn't won until the corpse is gone. There is no room for mistakes in your line of work.

You close your eyes and breathe in as the veil melts overhead, letting in the meagre moonlight to dance in the fog. It's thinner now, the atmosphere lighter – and when you throw the light of your torch over your surroundings, it acts normally with the environment, bouncing off the walls and burning away shadows the way light is supposed to, rather than swallowing it up and leaving the shadows as black as a void.

Curse dispatched, illness lifted. Done. But your job is not yet complete. Investigating the sorcerers' disappearance is your main objective, and you need to figure it out before it happens again.

You dust off your shoulders as you venture closer to the village noticeboard. Perhaps it holds a clue as to what happened to the sorcerer. You scan newspaper articles about proposed urban development, sales of household items, and a request to get someone's leaky roof fixed – 'payment decided on reception', the last one reads. Nothing particularly damning.

Stepping away, you run your torchlight briefly over the four edges of the noticeboard itself for thoroughness. You've run into dead drop locations before, and you wonder if the sorcerer shoved something in the frame itself. It'd explain why he was hanging around here and why the curse was still alive.

However, a close inspection of the varnished wood yields nothing. Not until you walk around the back side of the well and your torch illuminates a smear of reddish-brown on the edge of the grey stone.

The small roof over the well saved the mark from getting washed away in the rain. Your expression remains unchanged as you step closer and rub your thumb over the darkest part of it in the centre. It flakes off, dry, and retains its reddish hue as you rub it between your fingers. It doesn't crumble like dried mud and doesn't reveal a chalky, paler inside like crushed stone.

It's blood.

Dusting your hands off, you glance around, sweeping your torch over the nearby buildings. The recent rain would have washed away any signs of a scuffle in the mud. The cursed spirit's fingers, you had noticed, were a dirty brown-black, not red, and its dress was only dirty in a derelict way, with nothing suggesting it had plunged a hand into anyone's heart, as it seemed awfully intent on when you fought it. The sorcerer was likely not in the well because he did not fight the curse.

Then, you wonder, where was he?

You glance into the well anyway. Your enhanced senses pick up nothing at the bottom, nothing below the water. You turn around with a soft sigh, leaning heavily against the edge of the well. Your ribs throb with pain and your mouth twitches as you press a hand to it, taking the moment to heal and glance around.

It had been a lucky hit. You'd been more preoccupied with not being thrown to the ground since you still had to return to the old lady and her husband, and you weren't very fond of the idea of showing up looking like a pig in mud. You'd tanked a wide, arcing sweep of an arm you otherwise would've dodged with a roll, reinforcing yourself with cursed energy to ensure it wouldn't knock you down.

As reverse cursed technique crackles through your meridians, energy cool as mint, you evaluate your options. You could go to the rice paddies, check out those stories about the haunted fields. You weren't too worried about the 'soldier in the water' one, as it sounded more like a ghost story, and nothing attacked the woman in that moment and nothing's been seen since. Curses wouldn't wait sixty years to hurt people, especially when their home was a Venn diagram with a human village. The mention about recent disorientation when it shouldn't reasonably occur, however, was more concerning.

You could also continue investigating the town. Rogue sorcerers tended to hunker down in areas with more human activity, as their cursed energy traces would become muddied with regular humans', making it harder for hounds like you to sniff them out. If nobody in the village saw him leave, he was likely hiding out in one of the abandoned homes, waiting until you left to make a run for it.

"Ah, what to do, what to do…" you murmur to yourself, lowering your hand from your newly uninjured side. You push off the well with a stretch. Checking out the rice fields means you'll cover more area, more space for new clues, and if you do find another curse there or the sorcerer, it'll mean you won't have to go trespassing in old homes. It'd be rough going if anyone spotted you doing that; you'd look like a looter, and with your religious attire and unusual visiting hours, you'd seem even worse, morally speaking.

Paddies it is.

The trek over there is uneventful. You walk across a small bridge over an exposed drainage system and descend uneven stone stairs, the centres of each step worn down with decades of foot traffic. You stop at the edge of the fields, which stretches into the grey mist seemingly infinitely.

You sigh to yourself and blink exhaustion out of your eyes, torchlight swinging to one side. You begin to trace the outside of the fields, planning a route in your head to walk back and forth between each row. You must be thorough. However tired you are, you must be thorough.

There is nothing of note for the first three rows. You walk backwards for a few steps, shine your torch at the sky, and stretch your arms across your body to avoid the repetitive side-to-side observation lulling you into autopilot. Sort of like highway hypnosis, you note, breathing in the sharp, cold air. Only three more rows on this side to go.

You come across a second small toolshed, the wood worn and the corrugated iron rusted at the edges. You move towards it, grateful for the break in monotony, and unlatch the door and push it open.

The scent of blood assaults your nose. It's like a physical thing, making you recoil in shock as if taking a blow. The smell of blood mixed with dirt and the dampness in the air makes your stomach churn. The moisture advanced the decay significantly despite the blood that's still more red than brown pooling below the body. The dirt, when you trace your boot through it, clumps together, as opposed to the rest of the dry ground. There's a dusty white cloth haphazardly thrown over half the body, and you lean forward and pull it down.

Your heart drops like a stone. That's the sorcerer. His suit is slashed to pieces, deep wounds all over the body, and you notice in particular that the backs of his ankles are sliced. He could not run.

You lower yourself to your knees, clipping your torch to your belt. Your lips are already moving in a low, heavy chant, palms pressed together.

"I pray to the Buddha on your behalf. May you, under the Buddha's reception and guidance, be in the Pure Land, and suffer no worries, and attain all happiness. In the Pure Land: there are groves of seven-jewel trees and the water of virtue; there are beings of superior wisdom, virtue, and kindness. Please rest in peace with them, or take the vow to come back again. From now on: may you never be tormented by lower realms; may you never be concerned by evil people; may you never be plagued by worldly afflictions…"

He must have died in such pain. It could only have been a day, maybe less, since it occurred. The skin and cloth around every wound is soaked, implying each was made with a still-beating heart. You have seen many bodies in your life, made numerous yourself, but none with this level of… of clever savageness, with a complete disregard of the being within the physical body. No cursed spirit you've ever come across has tortured a person to death, made sure they could not escape, and hidden the body.

"I was wondering who they'd send after me. I'd hoped it would be one of you monks."

Your eyes remain closed, your hands pressed together, reciting the end of the Heart Sutra. "Because there are no obstructions, there is no fear. Because all the Buddhas of the three times have relied upon prajñaparamita, they have found anuttarasamyaksambodhi…"

"Hey. Hey, you – nutcase! Stop chanting!"

"For this reason, know prajñaparamita is the great spiritual mantra. The great understanding mantra. The supreme mantra—"

The voice behind you overlaps your own, sounding less amused now. "Oi, you arrogant prick!"

"—The unequalled mantra, able to cut through all vexation because in reality there is no emptiness. Speak the prajñaparamita mantra, speak the mantra’s words…" You open your eyes. "Gate gate pāragate pārasaṃgate bodhi svāhā."

You rise to your feet slowly. There are two presences behind you. Only one is a sorcerer; in the other, you can hear her rapid breathing, the slight irregularities of true fear. She leaks cursed energy in a particular way, and you recognise it like fingerprints to an individual.

It's the old woman from earlier.

It's Fumiko.

You don't turn your head completely. "What do you want?"

The man giggles behind you, cloth rustling, and Fumiko gasps in pain. Your hands ball into fists, buried in the folds of your robes.

"Depends! Which one are ya? Naoki? Tatsuya?"

"YN," you reply.

"Oh! Yes, yes, I've heard some rumours about you. C'mon, turn around, gimme a smile. Won't kill anyone just yet. Any more, at least. Hah."

You turn, eyes laser-focussed. The man is older than you, early- or mid-twenties, perhaps. Long, loose brown hair, the roots black with about an inch of natural growth. In one hand, he grips Fumiko's pale pink cardigan, and his other hand is splayed in a claw, silvery threads of cursed energy connecting each finger to her face and neck. Every twitch she makes shifts the threads taut, her skin pulling as if they're buried beneath the surface. Her hands are bound with rope.

His eyes widen. "Eh? What are you, sixteen? Thought you'd be older. Damn, what an embarrassment it'd be to fight a teenager…"

You ignore him. "Let her go."

"Now, why would I do that? I went through all the trouble of dragging her here. You weren't supposed to come so quickly – you didn't to the other ones, so I thought I had more time for set-dressing. But that's fine, I just had to improvise. Luckily, granny was close by."

"If you want a fight, I'll give you one," you say sharply. "But leave the woman out of this. How do you expect to fight with your hands full?"

He laughs. "Oh, no, no – no, no, no. I don't want to fight you. I want to fight LN Naoki. I want to kill LN Naoki. He murdered my older brother, you see. Murdered him, took his body, left me with nothing to even remember him by! So you – So you see, now, right, where I'm going with this? Yeah? My name is Yamada Daisuke and I want to kill your big brother, too. Eye for an eye, tit-for-tat, you geddit."

"Alright." Your eyes narrow at him. "You seek revenge against Naoki. But Tatsuya? Why mention him?"

"Oh, I dunno, I dunno. I just know he's one of ya, heard along the grapevine that he's tall and doesn't carry weapons, so I chucked the name out there in case it was you. Been doing my research. 'S not easy, by the way. You lot are so mysterious!"

He shrugs, yanking Fumiko closer. She winces. "Now, as to what I want, cutie – no, no, I can't say that, you're too young. Now, as to what I want: I want you to get a message to darling Naoki. Tell him I want to meet. And he better come alone, too – my cursed technique is wonderful at telling me who's where. It's like a spider's web. If he comes with more of you freaks, I'll know, and I'll kill this old crone. Peel her apart, layer by layer, just like that guy behind you. Just with, well, y'know – horizontal cuts. Not vertical. I've got just the perfect knife in mind! So yeah – do this for me, and I have no problems with letting you walk free."

Silence falls over the misty rice fields.

"Five seconds!" he says loudly, impatiently, tapping his foot rapidly against the sandy raised path between fields. "Decide!"

Your jaw tightens. "I can't tell my brother where to go if you don't give me a location."

"Oh, I didn't? Silly me!" he laughs. "Tell him to meet me in Nagoya, the place where he killed my big bro. Tomorrow night, midnight. No later than that or she gets it." He twitches his fingers, yanking at her frail skin. "We got a deal, bud?"

You meet Fumiko's terrified gaze for a long moment, hand flexing at your side. Your expression gives nothing away. Your eyes flick back to the young man.

He's broad-shouldered and carries himself with the alertness and ease of a physical fighter. Probably not too bad at close-quarter combat. He has a good weight advantage against you despite being around your height, and the most damning thing is his cursed technique. Seeing as he mentioned using them like a spider web in an area to locate enemies, he likely has the one thing you don't: range.

You need to get close. You just need to get close.

In the blink of an eye, you unsheathe your tanto and throw it deep into his shoulder. It cleaves all five cursed energy threads and he yells in pain as he stumbles away, tossing the old woman aside like trash. She hits the ground hard with a cry, something snapping wetly. You rush forward, grabbing her and dragging her away from the curse user. Before you can get three steps, silver threads shoot out and wrap around your throat, once, twice – you barely manage to reinforce your throat before the subsequent yank back sends you flying back towards him.

You gasp and choke as the curse user growls and grabs your collar, preventing you from getting up, and wraps a thick arm around your neck in a headlock. You scrabble at his face, finding the dip of his eye socket, and dig your fingers in until you feel wetness dripping down your fingers. You can feel the press of his eyeball and the hard wet surface of the inside of his skull. He roars and tightens his arm around you. You lower your head, briefly cutting into your throat more. Using your hooked fingers to keep him from dodging it, you slam your head back into his nose with a sickening crack.

"Agh, fuck!" he bellows, cupping his broken nose, gushing blood.

You break out of his grasp with a raspy cough, dissolving his threads around your throat with a touch and your disruption technique. There's a long garden hoe with a metal handle sticking out of the watery field. You grab it, flip it, and slam the handle into his side. He doubles over with a grunt and you lift the hoe, aiming at his head. He catches it on the downstroke with the typical resounding clang of cursed energy reinforcement.

Twisting his other hand midair, half a dozen threads spear into your chest and yank you to the ground. He seizes the garden hoe and strikes you – clang, clang, clang – until you manage to cut his threads and twist your body, throwing your lower half up and wrapping your legs around his middle. You throw him down and scramble for the hoe dropped a couple of yards away, but his strings coil around your ankle and hurl you straight through the toolshed with a deafening crash and clatter. You land hard with a winded gasp, your core aching where his strings harpooned themselves into you.

Nearby, Fumiko calls your name worriedly, her face pale and damp with fear.

"I'm fine," you wheeze, turning onto your front and tearing the threads out of your chest with a grunt. They come away covered in blood. "Don't move too much—"

Threads fling you thirty yards in the other direction.

Daisuke advances on Fumiko, flipping the garden hoe so the sharp steel is at the other end. He bares his teeth, his eye and nose pouring blood down his face. "All this effort to save an old hag. Ha! Those monks never know how to pick their battles. That'll be the end of them."

He raises the tool above his head, dull silver steel glinting menacingly in the grey mist. Fumiko's eyes widen before squeezing shut, and she ducks her head.

With a roar, you slam into him with a dropkick, landing securely on your feet with a flip. He tumbles and springs back up to his feet. "You're fighting me, Yamada!"

You slam your fist into his cheek, dodge his retaliatory punch, and strike the side of his knee. It buckles. You throw a vicious hook into his bleeding face. Before you can recover your momentum, his hand shoots out and silver strands hook around the remnants of the toolshed behind you in a U. They slice into your back and wrench you backwards. Using a few of the U-shaped threads, he slingshots himself forward and crashes into you before you can stand, his greater weight pinning you down. He whales on you with the garden hoe. He hasn't reinforced it well enough – with every strike, it dents, it bends, around the shape of your forearms.

Gritting his blood-covered teeth, he tilts the hoe forward, hooking the flat side of the steel beneath your arms, and yanks up, breaking your guard with a toss of the hoe. Dozens of hairlike threads pierce you, too thin and dense for your reinforcement to block it, like a needle through chainmail. Your arms slam to the sides. Daisuke pummels your face. He favours his right hand. You spit blood, teeth bared, fury blazing, arms straining with all your might.

"Bastards, all of you," he seethes, all his earlier humour gone, punctuating every sentence with a heavy strike. "All of you! None of you understand what you took from me! My brother! My only big brother! If I have to kill every single one of you false monks to get to LN Naoki, I will! I swear to fucking god I will! I'll end your family, just like you ended mine!"

With a growl, you manage to wrap a trembling hand around a handful of threads and yank hard. Daisuke's weight shifts abruptly, like a marionette on strings.

Your eyes narrow. He's attached to them. He must be attached to them for his technique to function.

With a jerk, one hand slices through the threads, dismantling them, and the other wrenches a handful of them to pull him down and keep him there. Your palm slams against his chest, your cursed energy surging forward and searing his meridians white-hot. He gasps, chokes, and relinquishes control of the strings keeping you down to instead manipulate the ones stuck in your shoulders. He uses the same pulley-leverage attack to send you crashing into the water of the rice field, forcing space between you.

The threads hurt. There are some dangerously close to your spinal cord, and every muscle twitch has your nerves screaming.

Hands plunge into the icy water and wrap around your throat. Dozens upon dozens of shimmery threads, strong as steel cables, impale you. You writhe and struggle, glaring up at the milky shadow above you. Every thread you snap is replaced with two more.

Your lungs burn like liquid fire. The hands tighten, reinforced with cursed energy. Your blood thickens the water into murky red. Your vision goes spotty.

Everything hurts. You can't move.

If you die here, you don't think you could ever face Satoru again. The humiliation would kill you harder. Humiliation, however, requires a sense of strong, individualistic identity, which is rather antithetical to every ideal you've grown up with. Identity, and the desire to be seen in only certain lights, is central to attachment.

Despite being raised in a temple, you aren't very good at this, are you?

With one final surge of vehement, boiling cursed energy, you rip your arm out of the binds holding you and strike Daisuke's stomach solidly with a palm. Your full palm connects.

His entire system ruptures. Every meridian explodes, every pathway shatters, and you can hear his scream even underwater as his hands shoot up to clutch his head. You shoot upright, gasping for air, and drag him into the water, submerging his head just as he did to you. With his broken meridians – the integral connection between cursed energy and the physical body – he is completely, irreparably, damaged.

You watch through the water dripping from your eyelashes as he thrashes, hands flailing and hitting your arms. His hands can't even close into proper fists, as if the tendons themselves are torn, burst apart like frayed rope. Bubbles rise to the surface of the water and his long brown hair sways over his face, obscuring his view – obscuring the rolling, terrified whites of his eyes.

You twist a steady hand in Daisuke's long hair, almost brushing it, almost comforting.

You snap his neck.

Your chest heaves, lungs still burning, throat still half-crushed. You stay there, panting, kneeling in the bloodied water, water dripping from your hair and soaking your clothes.

You stand and stagger a step or two before righting yourself. You climb out of the water and turn around, reaching into the water and grabbing Daisuke's body by the collar of his shirt. With impossible ease, you lift him out of the water and lay him gently on the sandy path, lifting his legs out of the water as well. You crouch down and close his eyes, lips moving in an inaudible prayer, before rising again.

With every step, your gait strengthens, and when you reach Fumiko thirty or forty metres away, who's shivering and gasping softly, the only visible pain you're in is when you yank out the remaining barbed threads by the handful. They flutter to the ground and gradually disintegrate.

You stop in front of her, bobbing down and checking the ropes around her wrists. Tied tight. "Are you alright, auntie?" Your voice is raspy.

She swallows, breathing shallow. "I think… something's happened with my arm."

You touch her arm on the side where she fell, and reverse cursed technique flows through you with its icy, minty coldness. There's a soft click, she jolts slightly, and her eyes widen as the pain vanishes in all but ten seconds. Every other old ache seems to disappear, too.

"Better?" you murmur, glancing up at her. Slowly, she nods mutely. "Good. Do you know where my tanto went? These ropes won't loosen on their own."

"Y-Yes… Over there. In the water."

"Thank you, auntie."

You fish it out and return, wiping the wet blade on your – admittedly damp – clothes. You kneel before her and gently take her bound wrists in one hand, sawing through the ropes.

"Why were you outside?" you ask, brow furrowing in concern. "It's cold. And late."

"I wanted to warn you about the rice fields. They seem endless even on the sunniest days," she replies shakily, watching as you tug at the ropes. "I-I worried you might lose your way before finding the path back to the village. You might have gotten sick, staying out here all night. I make charms for all the children; I wanted to give you one so that you might not get lost in this terrible fog."

She glances around at the grey mist, the pale moonlight finally breaking through the darkness. Her breathing steadies. "You did something about it, didn't you? It's… lighter."

"The children should be better now, too." You smile faintly and slice through the last rope. Your cool touch soothes the red rope burns etched into her skin, and with a blink, it's like they never even existed.

She watches the process silently, turning her hands over in something like wonder. You rub off a smudge of blood you'd accidentally transferred and rise to your feet, offering a hand.

She looks up at you and whispers, "You're… not normal, are you?"

"Are you afraid?"

Her gaze trails down to your hand.

"Not anymore." She takes it. You help her stand, keeping close in case she needs the support. She glances back at the two bodies before quickly looking away. "What will happen to... them?"

"I'll call someone to remove them. They'll likely arrive in a few hours and they'll be dressed similarly to the first stranger you saw – in suits, perhaps glasses. They can do more than I can in regard to honouring them properly." You wince at the bruising over your back, but focus on sealing the hundreds of tiny punctures and slashes from the threads. You gesture forward. "I'll walk you back. That was quite the fall you took."

She huffs, something like a laugh. She must still be in shock. "The fall? Oh, I'm made of tougher stuff than that. You should worry about yourself, dear. That man…" She shakes her head in disbelief, shuffling along the path. "Did you, er, know him?"

"Auntie, don't worry about me. I heal quickly." You tilt your head and offer your arm. She takes it. "I did not know Yamada Daisuke. But he knew my family. Indeed, I have two brothers named Tatsuya and Naoki… but Naoki is not like Tatsuya or me. He isn't a fighter; he's a more traditional monk, you could say. I don't understand why…" You trail off, then sigh and shake your head, plastering on a smile. "No matter. All that does matter is that you and the village are safe."

She looks at you curiously. "If I may, dear… what exactly are you? No monk I've ever seen does anything quite like that. And that young man, those… those strings…"

You suck on your teeth. You cannot lie. It is in the precepts. And you are not fond of memory alterations – you have seen it erase more than intended, more than necessary, and what is a person without their memories?

A hollow husk of what once was, a face without a name.

"May I entrust you with a secret, auntie?"

"Oh, I'm very good at keeping those. I keep the stash of alcohol in my house a secret to help my husband stay off it. Of course, he has a very sweet face which I love, but I'm quite firm about it and haven't ever peeped a word, no matter how much he pleads."

"I see." You chuckle. "Well, I am something you might call a shaman. Ghosts and yokai indeed exist, born of accumulated human suffering. Many are dangerous. I exorcise these creatures. Only in potentially fatal situations can non-shamans see them, so you will likely be alright unless you see one yourself, in which case, please, run as far as you can – you can't hurt them unless you were born with the ability. The man I fought is another shaman, and those 'strings' were his magic. As it appears he was only trying to lure my brother here, I doubt more like him will visit any time soon – thankfully."

She nods slowly, taking it in. "If you and the boy were both shamans, why did you fight? Are you not on the same side against the demons?"

"It is difficult, walking between the physical and spiritual worlds. Some shamans aren't… well-equipped to handle it. In the case they become violent and irrational, sometimes death is safest for all. You saw what Yamada did to me – I am stronger than most and still bled. If they turned their magic on non-shamans, it could be catastrophic. Protecting people is all I care about," you admit softly. "It's the first rule of civilisation for a reason. Humanity is defined not by the invention of the bag or permanent dwellings, but the first healed femur, an injury that would be fatal unless they were cared for by those stronger."

Together, you travel over the small bridge. "It is the simplest, most definitive guide on how to be a human being: protect those who cannot protect themselves. I was born in a temple. As a child, one master pulled me aside and said that I can forget every sutra and the name of every Buddha, as long as I never forget that I fight for something greater than the individual – that I fight for humanity itself."

Incidentally, that master was also the only one to not treat your violent anger like something you could not change, like a genetic flaw. She was the only one who saw the burgeoning self-hatred in a six-year-old boy and decided to nurture the love in you rather than the hate. Rage is selfish by nature. It was probably what led you – the you from a thousand years ago, so not really you, but still you, in a way – to denounce the world and scorch it clean.

Briefly, you smile at Fumiko as her house comes into view down the narrow street. "Ah – I ramble at the worst of times. Anyway, you were very brave tonight, though I'm sorry you were ever put in that situation in the first place. Again, please keep what happened and everything I've told you to yourself – fear is power in the spiritual world. I've only told you what I have because you were directly involved with Yamada, and I feel it's insulting to brush you off when you survived so much."

"Don't apologise," she says gently as she rises the steps to her home. Her bad knee no longer hurts. She pats your arm before you lower it. "Thank you for trusting me. Yokai, demons… I'm not surprised they really do exist. Somehow, I feel better knowing for certain they exist, but good people like you keep us safe. You take care, as well, dear, you hear me? Selflessness is noble, but you are also part of the humanity you wish to protect. You are very, very young… and I nearly watched you die. You don't seem too concerned about it, and that worries me. Be more concerned."

You frown slightly. "Are you saying I should be more… individualistic?"

"If yokai are made of our suffering, if they cause shamans to go mad, then they are too far removed from real people for me to judge you by Buddha's words. When I first saw you fight, I thought you adopted the kesa the way a scammer does. But if these monsters only know violence and cause violence, and only people like you can exorcise them, then does pacifism not become malicious? All I'm saying, dear, is that there is a great difference in the lives between a child shaman taught to kill and a wandering monk with an alms bowl," Fumiko says deliberately. "Take care of yourself. Would you like to come in for a meal, stay the night? You're soaked to the bone."

"Ah," you say absently, mulling over her earlier words. You shake yourself out of it and smile politely. "Thank you, but I fear my state would only invite more questions from your husband. I will travel back to Tokyo tonight. Also, I have someone waiting for me at… at home."

Home. The word feels strange on your tongue. Jujutsu High is not much of a home to you, large and lonely without the chatter of the temple's residents.

(But Satoru is there, isn't he? Your bright-eyed, sweet-toothed Satoru?)

"I suppose you're right about my husband, dear. Wait here, then," she says with a twinkle in her eyes. "I want to donate a blanket, at the very least. To keep you warm on the journey home – or, if nothing else, keep you from sticking to the seats."

When you return to Tanaka, your Kyoto-based manager, and gently knock on his window, he jumps wide awake at the bleary sight of your soaked clothes. He rolls down the window swiftly, punching the overhead cabin light on.

"Jesus Christ, kid! What happened to you? Fall into a paddy field?"

"Something like that," you reply dryly, leaning down. You shift the soft blanket in your arms, blue and red with a pink border – the same pink as Fumiko's cardigan. "It's dark out here. Mind letting me in, sir?"

"R-Right, yeah. Of course." He unlocks the back door with a click that echoes across the car frame. He folds his chair back up and twists around to watch as you clamber in, tucking the blanket around your shoulders and under you. "Should I be worried about that blood?"

"No need. Although, please call Kyoto for cleanup. The bodies of one sorcerer and one curse user are in the rice fields, about four rows in on the West side. They're on the path, so easily spotted. Oh, and I need a minor financial reimbursement form, please."

"Shit, curse user? Did something happen?" Tanaka asks, opening the glove box and leafing through a plastic folder of various bureaucratic forms.

"I was thrown through a toolshed," you reply easily, accepting the clipboard and pen with a murmured thanks. Tanaka, the wonderful manager that he is, has already pinned the standard mission report sheets to it beneath the reimbursement form. You're so tired you almost certainly would've forgotten about them. You print your name neatly at the top next to 'ATTENDING SORCERER'. "Nothing major."

"Of all things, a toolshed—?" Tanaka looks more tired than ever, dragging a hand down his scruffy stubble. He sighs as he switches the lights in the cabin from the front seats to the back ones for you, then flips open his phone to dial Kyoto. He watches you strap the seatbelt over your chest in the rearview mirror, lifting his phone to his ear. "Get stabbed by any exposed nails?"

You hide a yawn in your sleeve. You can't wait to return to a warm shower and bed. "No. Just beaten with a garden hoe."

"Right, of course. Wonderful..."

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