Ieiri Shoko lived in the girls' dorm.
These days she and her new classmate had grown familiar through phone and chat.
On Akiya's recommendation she signed up for Mixi[1]—the social site that launched last year. The interface was surprisingly pleasant.
She skimmed the homepage, searched for him, and sent a friend request.
Profile picture: the same rainbow knitted cat from Yaga-sensei.
He posted short diary entries and photos almost daily—little slices of life, food, street scenes, never selfies.
You could tell immediately: Asou Akiya was someone who knew how to enjoy living.
Then came a group invite.
Group name: [Jujutsu High Melon-Eating Duo]
[Asou Akiya: Ieiri-san, welcome to our secret base! Just the two of us!]
[Ieiri Shoko: What does "eating melon" mean?]
[Asou Akiya: Watching the drama unfold.]
[Asou Akiya: Here's to five chaotic years together. Yoroshiku!]
[Ieiri Shoko: Yoroshiku, Asou-kun.]
Seeing he used his real name in the group, she quietly changed her own nickname too.
[Asou Akiya: I'm guessing the next classmate arrives soon. Want to prepare a surprise?]
[Ieiri Shoko: …No ideas.]
She found herself typing more freely online, carefully avoiding any sorcerer jargon.
[Asou Akiya: No worries. We'll just play it normal. I'll keep you updated with first-hand intel. Need any fresh fruit or veggies for your dorm? I still have stock.]
[Ieiri Shoko: Yes please. Thank you.]
[Ieiri Shoko: I still can't believe there's no cafeteria.]
[Asou Akiya: Too few students, meal times all over the place. The senpais prefer eating out.]
[Ieiri Shoko: Do the faculty cook for themselves too?]
[Asou Akiya: Yaga-sensei does… but he might secretly receive love bentos.]
[Ieiri Shoko: ?]
[Asou Akiya: He's married. Different species from us single folk.]
[Ieiri Shoko: Couldn't tell. Also—why is the doll he gave me so… unique compared to yours?]
She phrased it as delicately as possible.
The thing sitting on her shelf was aggressively avant-garde. The longer she stared, the cuter it got in an ugly way.
[Asou Akiya: Yaga-sensei is serious—he doesn't deliberately make them "cute." I specifically begged for a cat. I guess in his mind all cats are cute by default.]
[Asou Akiya: Logging off. See you!]
He kept the enthusiasm perfectly balanced—genuine, but never pushy.
He really did want to drag her into the spectator seats with him.
After all, life at Jujutsu High was destined to be one long circus.
At the wall, Akiya pulled out his tape measure with religious devotion and checked his height again.
"172 cm… two centimeters taller than last month."
He felt both happy and aggrieved. "Ever since awakening cursed energy, my growth spurts are insane. Definitely above average now. Proof that cursed energy boosts the body instead of draining lifespan."
Comparisons are the thief of joy.
Fifteen-year-old Gojo and Geto were absolutely taller than him.
He lit a candle for his future self: Looks like "shorty" is locked in.
Then he clenched his fist.
No—he could at least shut Geto up, at least.
…
Late March.
Opening ceremony drew closer.
Akiya visited the classroom several times to clean. Out of politeness, Shoko came once and memorized the location.
He dragged dusty desks and chairs from the corner and arranged four neat seats.
Shoko's eyes drifted longingly to the window spot.
Watching him wipe the desks with serious concentration, she suddenly said,
"If we ever vote for class rep, you have my vote."
Akiya immediately guessed she'd gone to a normal school before.
Something catastrophic (probably on the level of losing her entire family) had awakened Reverse Cursed Technique in her.
"You sure? " he teased, pretending to campaign against himself. "If I become class rep, I'll be in charge of discipline. You won't be able to smoke right in front of me anymore, Ieiri-san."
"…"
Shoko was 100 % certain she had never once mentioned smoking in front of him.
"And for your health, minors should cut down on drinking too," he added sweetly.
"I retract my vote."
She raised both hands in surrender, walked straight to the window seat, and pressed a finger against the corner of the desk to test stability. "This one's mine, right?"
"Of course." Akiya's smile was gentle. "Ladies first."
"Where will you sit?"
She secretly hoped her neighbor wouldn't mind her napping.
"I have to protect girls' eyes," he declared with perfect seriousness. "So I'll save the handsomest guy for your neighboring seat—five full years of visual benefits.
Unless, of course, you think I'm the handsomest. Then I'll sit next to you on day one and run cover whenever the teacher looks your way."
Shoko's interest was officially piqued.
"Deal. Let's see who shows up."
Oh no.
She was actually looking forward to the first day of class now.
Thanks to that little exchange, every once in a while her gaze slid to Akiya's smiling face, trying to picture someone even better-looking.
Five years of eye candy sounded pretty great.
The only girl in the class: Ieiri Shoko's expectations ↑↑↑
Outside the classroom window, homeroom teacher Yaga Masamichi watched the two chatting.
"You two, come with me. Time to pick up the next new student."
"Yes, sensei!"
"Yes, sensei!"
This time the first-year supervisor drove them himself—giving the newcomer full VIP treatment.
…
10 a.m., Tokyo Station, Shinkansen platform.
A tall boy in a modified black uniform stepped off the train.
Hair tied in a small topknot, towering over the adult salarymen around him.
The uniform had been heavily customized: pants baggy and cargo-style, pockets big enough to stuff half the train station bentos into.
He scanned the crowd. Bangs shifted slightly, revealing narrow, fox-like eyes.
Where were the people sent to fetch him?
Then he spotted three figures in similar uniforms at the meeting area.
Left to right: Yaga Masamichi (whom he'd met once), an elegant black-haired boy he didn't know, and a brown-haired girl openly sizing him up.
Shoko was purely curious.
Akiya had only one thought:
Just how small ARE Geto Suguru's eyes?
Internet legend from his previous life claimed Gojo's Six Eyes under the blindfold were six times larger than Geto's slits.
Completely unscientific.
Which one of them actually had abnormal eye size?
Akiya had been dying to verify… until the moment he saw the infamous "bangs monster" in the flesh.
Hiss—!
From ten meters away the eyes were already invisible.
Akiya suddenly understood border collies: you can't see their eyes because of the black fur on their faces.
And Geto Suguru?
Skin the color of warm wheat, brows like slender willow leaves, a faint Buddhist gentleness across the whole face.
Squinting eyes or fox eyes? Impossible to classify.
Akiya fell silent.
From Geto Suguru's point of view, the scene was perfect.
His new homeroom teacher had personally come to fetch him, bringing two classmates who looked exactly like sorcerers should: the boy refined and handsome, the girl pretty in a cool way, both utterly composed, no trace of teenage restlessness.
Cursed spirits scattered in every direction, as though an invisible zone had been drawn around them.
(Actually the one scaring the spirits away was first-grade sorcerer Yaga Masamichi, but he was too old and therefore automatically filtered out of Suguru's attention.)
A dizzying sense of finally leaving the past behind washed over him.
Suguru hurried forward with his suitcase, schooling his expression—he didn't want his future classmates to think he was hard to approach.
"Yaga-sensei, I'm here. Hope I didn't keep you waiting. Are these two my classmates?"
He smiled with all the restrained grace of a model student.
Irises a rare violet, thick earlobes pierced with matte black studs that—against their owner's will—radiated delinquent energy.
"Geto Suguru, fifteen years old. My technique is Cursed Spirit Manipulation."
He offered the information politely, the way top students at elite schools introduce their specialties first, seeking acknowledgment.
Across from him,
the two classmates without innate techniques remained perfectly calm.
Shoko quietly blew a bubble with her gum and shot Akiya a sideways glance—she'd seen his student ID and heard him lament the lack of an innate technique before.
Akiya extended the hand of friendship on behalf of the girl, obsidian eyes warming.
"Asou Akiya. This is Ieiri Shoko. We only arrived a few days earlier, so don't feel behind. We're all the same age.
Let's enjoy the next five wonderful years together, Geto-kun."
He lingered on the word "five," voice soft, as though savoring the promise of days spent side by side.
Suguru's sensitivity to goodwill and malice was excellent.
He broke into a genuine smile.
"You're right, Asou-kun."
(He could've sworn those eyes had been staring intensely a second ago… probably imagination. The guy was extremely polite. They'd definitely get along.)
First impressions: mutually understanding and favorable. Done.
Yaga watched them fondly and spoke.
"There are four of you in first year. Look out for one another. A sorcerer's comrades are the ones you entrust your back to at the edge of life and death.
Geto, your circumstances are similar to Akiya's—you both awakened cursed energy outside sorcerer families. He's an orphan; you still have parents. You have a fallback. Treasure what you have."
Suguru straightened, answering with sincere sympathy. "I will."
Akiya pretended not to hear the unspoken "please look after the orphan" underneath Yaga's words.
Shoko's gaze drifted, still unable to pin down the new boy's personality.
But the looks…
A completely different flavor of beautiful boy.
Yaga checked his watch. "Almost noon. Lunch is on me—welcome to Tokyo."
He checked his watch. "Almost noon. Lunch is on me—welcome to Tokyo."
He asked what everyone wanted.
Suguru: "I eat anything. No dislikes."
Shoko: "I'm easy. No sweets."
Akiya, ever the caretaker: "Yaga-sensei, I'd love soba."
The moment the words left his mouth, Akiya could practically hear someone's affection meter tick up +1.
So this is the classmate who hates troubling others?
Cute.
Afternoon.
Three full and happy first-years returned to campus.
…
Boys' dorm corridor.
Yaga, relieved, handed Geto Suguru over to Akiya.
Let the kid make normal friends for once instead of obsessing over the walking disaster named Gojo who hadn't even shown up yet.
Suguru stared at the row of doors, suddenly paralyzed by freedom.
"Which room should I pick…"
Before he could decide, Akiya kindly warned,
"Geto-kun, I don't recommend the one next to mine. The walls are paper-thin. I'd hate to disturb you."
Suguru accepted instantly—he was secretly grateful.
His technique required swallowing curse marbles. The process was agony and tasted like a rag used to wipe vomit from a sewer. The last thing he wanted was the boy next door hearing him retch.
After one lap of the hallway, Suguru stopped in front of the triple-sized suite and its arrogant "GOJO" nameplate.
"That's tyrannical. One guy taking three single rooms? Is he some noble-rich heir?"
Akiya laughed softly. "Maybe a little more money and influence than you're picturing."
Now Suguru was curious about his new classmate instead.
With someone as emotionally intelligent as Akiya around, Suguru shed the stiffness of a boarding-school newbie and asked the same question burning in his chest:
"Can I see how he renovated it?"
Akiya spread his hands helplessly. "No key. Yaga-sensei forbade it."
Suguru thought for a second, then tested the waters.
"What if I opened it from the inside? Without anyone noticing?"
Are you a goody-two-shoes or a partner-in-crime?
Akiya gave the most innocent face in his arsenal, turned toward the empty corridor, and announced to no one:
"I can't hear anything. I can't see anything. What lovely weather today. Yaga-sensei must have gone to fetch your student ID, right?"
The message was received loud and clear.
The very next second—
Campus-wide alarm shrieked like a dying banshee.
A single low-grade curse that could phase through walls had barely slipped out of Suguru's shadow when the sirens started.
Suguru: "…???"
Akiya blinked once, perfectly calm, and soothed the panicked new boy.
"Don't worry."
Suguru exhaled.
Akiya continued cheerfully, "Sensei forgot to register the new student's cursed-energy signature again."
Suguru: "…"
He stared at Akiya suspiciously, unable to tell if this was sabotage or genuine stupidity.
Akiya beamed. "Why are you looking at me like that? I really forgot! Your curse scared me too. As compensation, I'll write the apology letter for you—just say you used a curse to carry your luggage."
Suguru rubbed his temple. "But a grade-four curse can't lift a suitcase…"
Akiya's eyes sparkled with mischief. "Then double down—release another one! Use a curse to cover up the first curse!"
Suguru side-eyed him, the corner of his mouth twitching as if he'd just seen through to Akiya's soul.
This time he didn't ask permission—
he just went for it.
"You promised you'd write the apology!"
"Already done."
He just hadn't expected it to happen so quickly.
…
That very night, after receiving his scolding, Geto Suguru officially moved into the third room in the row, setting the glorious record of writing a reflection letter on the very first day of school.
The current layout of the boys' dorm became:
[Asou Akiya] [Empty] [Geto Suguru] [Empty] [Gojo][Gojo][Gojo] [Empty] [Empty]…
Suguru's stomach growled like a low-grade curse.
The once-in-a-millennium Cursed Spirit Manipulator invited the boy who knocked to come in, saw the cup of instant noodles in his hands, and made the bitterest face imaginable.
His fridge was a barren wasteland.
Rookie mistake—he hadn't stocked up on emergency food before moving in.
If he'd had a little more savings, he really wouldn't have wanted to expose his poverty like this.
After slurping down the noodles, Suguru sat cross-legged on the freshly cleared tatami and declared,
"I can't understand why there's no cafeteria. When I graduate, I'm opening one right here at Jujutsu High."
Akiya clapped enthusiastically. "Brilliant plan. Ieiri-san and I are 100 % behind you. We'll be your first customers on opening day."
Suguru felt a cursed orb + instant-noodle aftertaste rise in his throat.
"Do you eat this every day?"
"Of course not. I cook whenever I have time. This cup was specially saved as a welcome gift for the new classmate."
"…And that classmate is definitely only me, right?"
"No, no. The young master two doors down still hasnquist't arrived."
"Will that guy even eat instant noodles?"
"Just the thought that counts."
Suguru, already picturing some spoiled drama protagonist, muttered, "Do you think… think we'll live to see the day a cafeteria actually opens after he enrolls?"
"Everything is possible."
Akiya cleared the table. Suguru tried to stop him—"You already fed me, I'm not letting you clean too"—but Akiya brushed him off, found a leak-proof trash bag, and said, "Dump everything in here at once. High doesn't make us sort garbage."
Trash duty done, the two stepped outside together to the designated bin.
Moonlight spilled over the quiet mountain forest, insects singing softly. Suguru lingered on the veranda, reluctant to go back inside. The sullen resentment that had driven him to run away from home, to fight with his parents, to come to Tokyo alone—gone, completely gone.
No one in his old life had understood why he had to do this.
Thank goodness he had been right.
He turned to the shadow the moonlight didn't reach. The other boy hadn't left; he was leaning against the wall at the corridor entrance, waiting, slippers peeking out, utterly relaxed in a way Suguru envied.
"Asou-kun… Yaga-sensei said our backgrounds are similar. I can feel it too—we're the same kind of people. After you started seeing curses… did anyone ever misunderstand you?"
"No."
"…Lucky you."
Suguru wasn't satisfied with the answer, but Akiya really hadn't experienced that.
Akiya added quietly, almost to himself,
"We're not the same kind."
That gentle voice drifted over.
"What are you talking about?" Geto Suguru frowned, speaking seriously. "We are sorcerers. We possess power ordinary people do not. We were born shouldering the duty to maintain peace, the protectors who endlessly battle cursed spirits beneath human society. How are we not the same kind?"
Asou Akiya casually asked, "Have you read Hunter × Hunter?"
Geto nodded.
Akiya stepped half a pace forward, raising a hand to shield his eyes from the moonlight, as though Geto himself were part of that blinding light.
"You are 'Neon'—a natural Nen user." Akiya spoke slowly. "And I am someone who awakened Nen later in life. My ceiling might only be the starting point of your life. In this world, every single person has the chance to awaken cursed energy. Everyone is a potential sorcerer. It's just that awakening cursed energy is crueler than awakening Nen. When facing desperate situations, those who fail usually die."
Geto still did not understand the cruelty of the jujutsu world and joked, "Then the ones who survive—are they not even more impressive?"
Akiya lowered his gaze and smiled without speaking.
He did not intrude, did not guide. He tolerated the boy's naïveté, hiding the indifference in his heart.
If this were the Bungo Stray Dogs world, a special-grade sorcerer would be equivalent to a Transcendent—someone who could fight an entire country alone. When such a person stood on the side of justice, they brought security. Once they went mad, they were terrifying. The brain of the strong rarely listened to the words of the weak. Geto Suguru worshipped strength; the arrogance in his bones was no less than Gojo Satoru's. He lumped all ordinary people into the category of "the weak," and his words were full of immature worldviews.
To Akiya, Geto was like Senjū from the Spirit Detective era of Yu Yu Hakusho—even more naïve than that Senjū.
He did not want to play the villain and shatter a young man's beautiful dream of protecting the weak.
At the same time, he saw clearly: the potential danger behind Geto Suguru surpassed even Gojo Satoru!
Kenjaku was watching Geto.
That was the innate technique Kenjaku dreamed of possessing.
Geto's personality was so "twisted" for three reasons: first, Japan's weak political education; second, Kenjaku's deliberate grooming; third, the overwhelming power of Cursed Spirit Manipulation, which could subdue curses two grades lower, never having suffered a true beating from society. Akiya realized he had stepped too close. The price of being classmates with Gojo Satoru—he could bear. The price of being friends with Geto Suguru—he could not. It was safest to remain a classmate and dorm-mate at a comfortable distance.
"Geto-kun, I'm going back to read Yu Yu Hakusho." Akiya let out a soft sigh, withdrawing the day's excessive warmth, and spoke with distant indifference. "The mountain forest at night is gloomy, the high tower eerie, the insect cries irritating. When you're admiring the scenery alone, don't catch a cold."
Geto did not understand.
The tower in the forest was magnificent, the insect noises present but not yet summer—intermittent, almost meditative. With his constitution he could stand outside all night and not fall ill.
His classmate's footsteps gradually faded into the dorm room.
The door closed.
Geto lost the ease he had felt while they were talking together. His expression cooled. He took out his "second-grade sorcerer" student ID from his pocket, stared at it for a moment, then thought absentmindedly:
Are we actually compatible… or not?
—He made me write a reflection letter. Total black-bellied schemer.
—He wrote the reflection letter for me. A thousand words! He's a good guy!
In short, my classmate is essentially an otaku obsessed with 2D. Even at Jujutsu High he doesn't forget to read manga.
[1] Note: An online Japanese social networking service. It opened in 1999 and is owned by Mixi, Inc.