An Alpha's Jurisdiction | Omega!Naoya Zenin x Fem!Alpha!Reader
Everyone heard of Naoya Zenin as the cruel and entitled Alpha heir of the Zenin. However that couldn't be farther from the truth. He's an Omega, and by hierarchy, his clan decided it was time for him to be disciplined. You're an Alpha from a clan of modest standing, however, due to your illegitimate conception, you've lived your entire life hiding as a Beta, your family far too embarrassed that a bastard child would override decades of a “pure lineage”. The Zenin have decided you're the enforcer Naoya needs. Will you keep him on his best behavior and survive the jaws of the political disputes in the Jujutsu world?
Warnings/tags: omegaverse, bratty Naoya, slowww burnnnn, me being the most long-winded writer ive ever seen, difficult relationship with family, long text.
Chapter 1: A Bastard's Value
Naoya Zenin had always prided himself in his superiority, something that went undoubted the more you heard of him. However, it was rarely about power at this point, of course, you were sure the man had to possess some kind of tactical advantage, otherwise he wouldn't pride himself with his title as leader of the Hei, but the more people spoke, the more it sounded like they were afraid of his personality rather than his abilities. Let it be how he'd sneer at the mere sight of an omega or the way he spoke of himself with delusions of grandeur whenever a person had something to criticize about him. His reputation precedes him and most people wouldn't dare to even assume he was anything but a disgustingly spoiled alpha.
Which, in hindsight, might be the reason why your grandfather, the head of your clan, almost spat his sake in a poor servant's face when faced with the contents of the letter sent to him by the Zenin.
You jolted as the senile man, Mujiro Harume, struggled to catch his breath.
“W-what is it, sir?” You'd try to interject politely. You had already found the entire situation strange when your grandfather, usually a man of few words and even fewer affection, practically dragged you into his study speaking of a letter from the Zenin with your name on it. Your status as the bastard daughter of a scandalous affair between his eldest son and some low standing scum didn't help, you knew most of your clan, including Mujiro, looked down on you, but now you were sure either the leader of the Harume clan had gone mad or the Zenin wanted your head on a silver platter.
“Read.” He'd respond, shoving the parchment into your hands. Your eyebrows knit together as you did as told. The perfect calligraphy on the sturdy paper reading as follows:
“To the Esteemed Head of the Harume Clan, Mujiro Harume,
It is with the preservation of the bloodline and the stabilization of our respective circles in mind that I address you.
For too long the Zenin name has been synonymous with a specific brand of excellence. However, we have come to recognize that even the sharpest of blades need a steady hand to guide it, lest it break.
We are formally proposing a marriage contract between your granddaughter, Y/N Harume and my youngest son, Naoya Zenin.
While the world knows Naoya as the pride of our clan and a dominant Alpha, the truth within these walls is a heavy burden and a matter of honest shame we can no longer carry alone. Naoya is, in biological fact, an Omega. His secondary gender has long been suppressed by medical intervention and sheer force of will since his presentation, but his temperament has become increasingly unmanageable. He requires a partner who possesses the martial prowess and the Alpha authority to suppress his outbursts and ensure he keeps fulfilling his duties to the clan, all while maintaining the privacy the matter deserves.
In exchange for this ‘correction’ and your silence, we would offer political immunity, but the previous contents of this letter already proved we have other ways of guaranteeing secrecy.
Your granddaughter's reputation for stoicism is well-known, as is the misconception regarding her secondary gender. While the masses see a Beta of modest standing, we have our own sources, and while I can't personally understand why your people would hide such a leadership prone Alpha, we know her strength and conditioning match our requirements for a handler.
Naturally, it has come to our understanding that the nature behind her conception are a matter of shame for the Harume. To such an extent that you hide her true secondary gender, in avoidance of the mortification behind a bastard child possessing greater strength than your legitimate successors. Seeing that the Zenin have access to such information, it's an obvious statement that this arrangement is not a choice, lest you're willing to pay for it with your reputation.
In exchange for her services, however, the Zenin Clan offers the Harume more than just political silence. Upon the signing of this contract, we will grant your clan exclusive access to the Kamo-Zenin trade routes, as well as the possession of a Grade 1 Cursed Tool, to be held by your granddaughter as part of her dowry. Furthermore, we shall provide the financial backing required to restore the Harume estate to its former glory: a small price for the stability of our heir.
Should you accept, the union will be public, maintaining the facade of a traditional Alpha-Beta pairing. The reality of what happens behind closed doors, however, will be entirely under your granddaughter's jurisdiction. We expect her to be... thorough in his discipline.
We look forward to your affirmative response.
Respectfully,
Naobito Zenin
Head of the Zenin Clan”
The silence that followed afterwards was deafening, interrupted only by the sound of a servant refilling your grandfather's cup
Naoya Zenin. An Omega.
The irony of it was almost enough to make you laugh, if it wasn't from your grandfather's piercing cold glare. You'd suppress the instinct to sneer, the remains of your “Beta” mask.
“They know,” he started. “After all my efforts to keep it undercover, to make sure no one knew that the one stained mutt in this family was an Alpha of higher standing than my fiercest children. The years I've spent making sure you'd behave like the dull, unremarkable Beta you should've been… And yet, the Zenin have eyes in every shadow.”
You looked down, as you'd been taught to do whenever someone confronted you, even when your blood boiled, even when the absolute need to take control clawed at your chest from within.
“But I guess you're not so useless after all.” He huffed, a tone that was half defeat and half amusement. He took a long drag of his sake, his eyes gleaming with a sudden, predatory greed. “To think, the Zenin are willing to hand over the Spine of the Gale and open their trade routes just to have a Harume 'bastard' keep their precious heir in line. It’s a bargain I’d be a fool to pass up.”
He stood up, his joints popping as he walked over to the window, looking out at the crumbling stonework of the estate, the very "glory" Naobito promised to restore.
“You will go,” he commanded, not looking at you. “You will play the part of the modest Beta wife. Let Naoya scream, let him sneer, let the world believe he is the sun and you are merely the shadow at his feet. But the moment you are behind closed doors...” He turned, pointing a gnarled finger at you. “You are to be exactly what that letter asks for. A handler. If he shames the Zenin name by letting his nature slip, or if you fail to break that temper of his, don’t bother coming back here. We’ll be far too busy enjoying our new trade routes to care for a failure.”
You kept your head bowed, but a dark, sharp thrill raced through your veins. Your grandfather thought he was selling you off like a piece of livestock, but for the first time in years, you weren't being told to suppress yourself. You were being told to hunt.
“I understand, Grandfather,” you whispered, the words smooth and deceptively obedient.
“Make sure to start packing your things,” he grunted, dismissing you with a hand “You better be ready, if they're that desperate, they'll be calling you in soon… And Y/N”
You paused at the sliding door.
“Try not to kill him within the first week. It would be a waste of a very expensive dowry.”
. . .
Your grandfather rarely seemed to be wrong, and this wasn't going to be the occasion. As soon as he replied back accepting the arrangement, you were given a date to “visit” the Zenin estate. You were given little detail other than to stop taking your pheromone suppressants three days prior to the meeting. You assumed it was to make the situation feel real, to show Naoya what he was about to face. Although, you couldn't help but wonder if he would be instructed to stop taking his suppressants as well? The thought made something in your guts churn to life.
The drive to Zenin grounds was incredibly restless. It had been a while since you last felt your own body without the weight of the suppressants to shrink you. Your system felt like you might as well be on the edge of a rut, but you knew better.
You took a deep breath that made your grandfather, sitting beside you and nearest to the car window, raise an eyebrow.
“Tch, been a while huh? Try not to pounce the man when we see him.”
He said in a dismissive tone, looking at the cloudy weather outside, a few droplets had already begun to pour, dotting the car's windows.
As the car pulled up to the driveway of the main gate, you barely waited for your grandfather to get out himself, already hopping out like a kid on a school field trip.
You stretched out and you could swear you saw the Zenin servant holding your umbrella flinching at the sheer size of you. Earning a scoff from the old man.
When the gates opened, you were hit with the slap of a thousand different scents that the suppressants once made bleak. But now? It was a sensory cage.
The first thing you smelled was the earthy scent of the rain, it filled your system with the sensation of springtime, that made you restless on itself. Then came the neutral, ancient wood smell of the Zenin mansion, barely relevant but to the electric brain of an Alpha recently off her suppressants? Even that was enough to make you shudder. You almost sniffed the air when guards came to fetch you.
Your grandfather mumbled something about your “lack of decorum” but you were far too busy tracking the movements of the passing servants. You and your grandfather were led deeper into the mansion until you came to a halt in front of a shoji screen, although maybe that wasn't the element you should be paying attention to, if your grandfather stepping on your foot was any indicator.
You scrambled into a bow when you realized Naobito Zenin was the one standing in front of you.
“A-apologies, sir. I didn't… didn't see you there.”
Naobito didn't give you the grace of a raised eyebrow, he only hummed.
“She is quite distracted, isn't she?”
He asked, obviously to your grandfather, who also found himself in a respectful bow, far lighter than yours, of course.
“Yes, my apologies, Zenin-san. It's been a long while since she's been off her suppressants. And with the mere thought of an Omega to be her mate…”
Naobito sighed “The troubles of a young Alpha. Do not worry, that is to be expected.”
He gestures for the pair of you to follow, “Come. The preparations for the public ceremony are already underway. Naoya is waiting. He has been briefed on the… necessity of this union”.
As you paced behind the Zenin elder, you couldn't help but wonder how Naoya took to the news of the engagement. The letter your grandfather had received clearly exposed this wasn't of his wanting.
“Y/N,” Naobito suddenly halts to a final shoji screen, not looking at you as he speaks “I'm sure you're aware of your duties. Naoya doesn't take kindly to this arrangement, so he won't be very cooperative.”
You nodded, he continued.
“In public, you are to play the part. But in the privacy of this inner circle, you are the enforcer. Don't give him the upper hand, you're his Alpha after all.”
At that, something in your chest stirred. You bit your lower lip as Naobito entered the room, you and your grandfather following behind.
Here, the scent changed completely. Not the springy smell of the damp earth, not the ancient wood that surrounded you, and most definitely, not the sweet, caressing, addictive scent of an Omega.
Instead, what you smelled made your nose scrunch up, it was… almost empty, but yet it was sharp. The synthetic smell of high-grade pheromone suppressants, along with a cologne made to mock the scent of an Alpha.
Naoya Zenin was lounging on a raised dais. He looked exactly like the photographs you were shown, and yet nothing like them at all. The sharp features were there, the natural condescending smugness in his expression, but something was missing. The calling scent he was supposed to wear for his Alpha, you felt none of it.
“Is this the Harume girl? I expected something… more polished. She looks like she's about to go into a rut on my carpet”
You didn't realize you were growling until you saw Naoya's expression twist, as if he was trying to keep his image, even when every instinct in him told him to behave. This was his Alpha and she was demanding him to be quiet.
The low rumble emanating from deep in your chest seemed to thrum in the floorboards all the way into Naoya's brain, tingling at the dormant part that made his knees weak.
Beside you, your grandfather had stiffened, his hand twitching as if he wanted to strike you for the lapse in your “decorum”, but a sharp, sideways glance from Naobito held him in place. The Zenin elder wasn't offended, he was observing.
Naoya however, looked like he had been slapped.
He gripped the wood beneath him so tight that his knuckles were white. The fake Alpha cologne he wore was a mere joke in comparison to the pheromones you were beginning to leak.
“How… feral,” Naoya finally spat, though his voice climbed a half-octave higher than his usual tone. He stood up from the raised dais, smoothening the front of his hakama with trembling fingers. He refused to look at you in the eye, his gaze focused on your throat instead.
“Is this what you brought into our home, father? A dog that can't even hold it's own tongue in the presence of its betters?”
Now, Naoya Zenin was many things, but he was not stupid… or at least not that stupid. Everyone in that room knew he wasn't part of “your betters”, he was an Omega. Not that you cared much for the hierarchy, but last you checked, the Zenin don't look very high upon Omegas, seeing them as nothing more than a breeding, servant-adjacent class. An Omega should always walk behind an Alpha. Naoya was an Omega, but he talked about himself like he wasn't. That made you wonder, just how much of those lies have they been feeding him?
He took a bold step toward you, gathering the guts to finally meet your gaze, trying to reclaim his dignity. Up close, his scent was even more nauseating, it was metallic, purposeless and fake. Because you were off your own suppressants, you noticed the details he couldn't hide, even if he tried.
Like the way his pulse hammered against the side of his neck, and the slightest dilation of his pupils.
“Listen here, Harume,” he sneered, giving you a once over like you were the most disgusting thing he had ever witnessed “you're lucky, this arrangement isn't of my doing. Lucky I can't walk out of it. Because if I had any control over this? I wouldn't give you the time of day.”
He scoffed, about to take a step back when you grabbed his wrist in a heavy, bruising grip.
“Is that so?” You muttered, eyes looking down at him with a ferocity you barely recalled having, but that felt so natural, especially when directed at him.
“You're delusional then, Naoya. Because this isn't like the little theater you play out there with the suppressants and the cologne. You can't pretend to be the Alpha here.”
Your hand itched to grab him by the face, by the neck, to force him into submission, but you still had some sense left.
“This is the real world. And last I checked? You're my Omega now, so you'll do as I say, when I tell you to do it. Are we understood?”
You could've sworn you heard a whimper from Naoya as he bristled and pulled back from your hold, caressing his wrist where you gripped it. It was probably going to leave a bruise.
“Tch, whatever.” He muttered to himself. “This isn't over, just so you know.”
He cast one last cowardly look over his shoulder before walking out and slamming the sliding door shut.
A heavy silence took over the room for a solid minute before Naobito spoke up
“Very well,” he sighed, not casting a single glance to where his youngest son just left. “She'll do, although we already expected that. I'll be sending you the final papers, Harume-san, then we'll decide on a date for the ceremony”
Your grandfather nodded, still gathering himself, torn between your behavior and Naobito's approval.
“For now,” the Zenin elder continued “Naoya will be left to his own thoughts. But I look forward to one more meeting before the official ceremony.”
An unknown sensation crept up to your chest. It felt like… ownership, even if you were yet to tame the mare they'd given you. But Naoya had said it himself, there was no way out of this.
Not that you wanted one.