It was nearly six in the morning.
Asou Akiya finally managed to herd Gojo Satoru off to brush his teeth and wash his face, then, after considerable effort, succeeded in sealing the white-haired menace inside his blanket like a particularly stubborn burrito.
He reached for the light switch and turned it off.
In the sudden darkness, a pair of Six Eyes glowed an eerie, spectral blue—somehow both beautiful and deeply unsettling.
Those eyes watched the two of them without blinking.
Akiya gently but firmly steered a worried-looking Geto Suguru out of the room before any serious conversation could start. "Akiya, yesterday Headquarters—"
"We'll talk at school," Akiya interrupted softly. The tall boy with the undone topknot looked exhausted, yet youth kept the worst of the fatigue at bay; he didn't yet wear the heavy shadows that would one day ring the eyes of seventeen-year-old Geto Suguru in the height of summer. "Suguru, thank you for keeping Satoru company all night. There are still two hours until eight—go get some sleep. I'll wake you both in the morning."
The moment he heard that Akiya was still planning to act as everyone's human alarm clock, Suguru's drowsiness evaporated. He stepped forward, planted himself in his own doorway, and blocked Akiya's path with one arm—attitude unmistakably firm. "Stop accommodating us!"
Akiya's mood was low; he answered without energy. "I'm not tired. I slept on the train."
The real reason he couldn't sleep was that he needed to go home and review every second of yesterday's performance.
Even though he had been forcibly detained, he still offered Suguru reassurance. "I'm not blaming you. I actually really like Satoru's game console too."
Suguru relaxed at once. So Satoru had played games with Akiya before? Then everything was fine.
Akiya thought to himself: [You're overthinking again, Suguru.]
Suguru believed Akiya was always thinking of others first; Akiya himself didn't consider his actions particularly selfless. Most of the time they were simply things he did along the way. The majority of Japanese high-school boys simply lacked the basic consideration most people owed their peers.
Against the backdrop of Gojo Satoru's personality, Suguru's way of making friends felt almost painfully sincere.
[The goodwill of a teenage boy is priceless all the same.]
Akiya yielded a step. "Since you're not going to sleep, I won't force you. How about we go outside and talk instead?"
Suguru agreed.
The two left the dormitory and walked into the mountain forest, far enough that even the Six Eyes couldn't eavesdrop.
As they climbed the stone steps up the hillside, Akiya's gait grew lighter, almost carefree. "Which do you want to ask first—why I didn't let you come with me, or what happened at Headquarters? You only get one question from me."
Suguru's protective nature made the choice inevitable. "What happened at Headquarters."
For the first time, Akiya and Suguru climbed the mountain slowly together, without hurry, without treating it as training—just two temporary traveling companions breathing the free morning air.
Akiya spoke casually, as though discussing the weather."Yesterday, I met a room full of powerful men so consumed by greed, they've forgotten what it means to be human."
Hearing that the leadership above the high school was that rotten made Suguru frown. "Not a single decent person among them?"
Akiya hopped up three steps at once, spun around, and began walking backward without the slightest fear of falling.
"They're probably three times worse than whatever you're imagining."
A whole room full of rotten tangerines.
"Even if a decent person ever wandered in there by mistake," Akiya continued, tilting his head back as though studying the low, oppressive clouds that perpetually hung over every sorcerer's life, "the fossils would have assimilated him years ago. You'll run into far worse trouble later, so consider this your vaccination: never trust a single verbal promise they make. The only thing that belongs to you is what you can hold in your own two hands."
The threat posed by the Six Eyes to Headquarters grew with every passing day.
Headquarters would court the Cursed Spirit Manipulator; Suguru, for his part, still found it hard to see the full depth of their cold, merciless rot.
"What exactly did they want you to do?" Suguru asked, already thinking the worst. "Spy on me and Satoru?"
"First, surveillance," Asou said coolly. He raised a hand and traced three descending lines in the air with his fingers—each stroke marking a step deeper into ruin. "Then, intelligence gathering. Then, identifying weaknesses. And finally…" His voice dropped to a whisper. "…to turn you into a traitor planted right beside us."
Then, turning the tables, he threw his full support behind Akiya. "Don't worry. I won't give Headquarters an opening. And if they ever do ask you for Satoru's weak point, feel free to tell them the truth: he's a helpless baby who can't take care of himself."
Akiya looked at him steadily. "Do you really think I'd agree?"
Suguru's gaze locked onto the black-haired boy's expression, peripheral vision tracking every careless backward step.
"It wouldn't matter if you did."
It was tragic when the weak were forced into unequal contracts.
"Being this kind almost makes you sound fake, Suguru."
No one liked a traitor.
"I'll just get stronger," Suguru declared, smiling with the easy confidence that grew stronger every day he spent learning the true shape of the jujutsu world. "Strong enough that no one will ever dare force you to spy on us again."
Akiya stared at him in silence.
How could a single person house both boundless kindness and bottomless cruelty? Toward fellow sorcerers he was gentle enough that even betrayal wouldn't make him raise a hand; toward future non-sorcerers he would one day loathe them enough to exterminate without hesitation.
"They don't dare kill me," Akiya said lightly, as though remarking on the weather. "I refused them."
Suguru's eyes flew wide. For the first time, on this sleepless dawn, he brushed against the raw, unfiltered core of his classmate.
The cold, sidelong glance Akiya leveled at him carried a weight no weakling should possess.
"I used my life as leverage to force them to let me go."
"——!!!"
Suguru's mind reeled; he could not begin to imagine what horrors Akiya had endured to speak those words so calmly.
A sudden shadow pressed against Suguru's vision, dizzying him. Akiya continued, reading him like an open book. "You're wondering why I didn't just call you and Satoru for help? Pointless. I made my peace with this world long before I ever enrolled. If anyone tries to use me for their dirty schemes, I'll tear a chunk of flesh from their bones with my dyingh teeth even if it costs me everything."
As he spoke, something wild and predatory lit in Akiya's eyes—the gleam of a hunter who had finally scented blood.
Asou Akiya grew more animated with every word, until a hunter's gleam—sharp, cold, and unmistakably alive—flared in his dark eyes.
"I'm no lamb waiting meekly for the slaughter."
If death ever cornered him, no one could predict what secrets he would spill in his final breath or how much chaos those secrets would unleash.
Should despair truly claim him, Akiya would offer the world his most sincere curse: he would carve his malice into the hearts of every elder in Headquarters and end his short, tempestuous life in a storm that would shake the jujutsu world to its foundations.
They had climbed high enough for dawn to scatter the darkness. Below them lay the mountain forest and the distant high tower; late-April insects filled the air with ceaseless song.
The black-haired boy smiled with slow, dangerous tenderness. He pointed downward with his index finger. "This is the jujutsu world."
He lifted his middle finger toward the tower. "Those are the higher-ups."
Then, with his pinky raised like a mocking afterthought, he gestured at the invisible insects swarming the breeze. "And these are the dangers you will face in the future—endless, relentless. Let your guard down for even a moment and you will be devoured whole."
Geto Suguru's breath caught; the familiar landscape suddenly looked utterly alien.
"Suguru." The morning wind curled around them both, but Akiya had already turned to climb higher. "After what happened at Headquarters, I realized we each carry our own burdens. You might not live any better than I do. And I might not be the one laughing in the end."
Unnoticed, Suguru had absorbed far too many of Akiya's beliefs; he could no longer lie to himself.
"So the reason you keep your distance from me… is this?"
"Not entirely."
"Tell me the rest, then!" Suguru demanded.
"I cannot shoulder the risks that come with you. I would rather stay distant than become someone else's expendable pawn."
Akiya refused to meet Suguru's eyes. He spoke the brutal truth flatly, as though ending the conversation, and started back down the mountain path.
Suguru released a cursed spirit.
For the second time, he forced his will upon a classmate.
A strange, molten fury flooded his chest: regret that he had nearly watched Akiya walk to his death, shock at the blackness of the jujutsu world, all of it braided together into a single, searing refusal to let Akiya leave—especially after Akiya had dismissed his strength, had declared him insufficient protection. The burning need to reach Special Grade erupted like wildfire.
"Your 'last words' yesterday," Suguru said, voice low and trembling with intensity, "I was the only one who listened to them seriously."
"I went to pick up that package you asked me to retrieve. There was nothing in it. Satoru doesn't care about you at all!"
"Akiya, we are the same—"
"We both hate troubling others. We both come from ordinary families. We stepped into this world at practically the same moment. I never imagined you would distrust me this much, that you would think I'd drag you down."
"Don't underestimate me!"
Suguru raised his arm. A Grade-2 cursed spirit—massive as a three-storey building—surged forward on command and seized Akiya, hoisting him high into the air.
Akiya dangled helplessly, legs kicking above empty space.
For one bizarre, suspended instant, it felt exactly like swinging on a playground swing.
"What's the point of this?" Asou Akiya asked, voice soft and perfectly innocent, as though he were genuinely curious about the answer.
"To make you feel the gap between us," Geto Suguru replied. No trace of a smile touched his face; dark cursed energy seeped from him like smoke. "You're willing to be friends with Satoru because Satoru can give you safety. That bothers me. A lot. And I'm done arguing about it."
"I think I already guessed it. You think, deep down, that Satoru is stronger than me."
"If friendship has to be decided by strength, then it's time you saw mine."
"This year, before he does, I will become a Special Grade sorcerer."
"Next time!"
"I will go with you to Headquarters to face those people!"
"If they dare try to use you to spy on me, I will turn on them without hesitation and make them pay the price!"
There was no denying it: the words Geto Suguru spoke rang out like a sorcerer's vow, solemn and soul-shaking, impossible to ignore.
To know and not act is the same as not knowing; to know and to act as one is the path of the sage.
In that moment Suguru's every word and gesture fused into perfect unity. He was a rare light in the jujutsu world, a light that had not yet reached many others, but which now poured itself entirely, fiercely, protectively over Akiya alone, granting his classmate the freedom to live an ordinary school life.
Akiya closed his eyes. He did not want to look, yet the corners of his mouth lifted helplessly into a smile.
Another hopelessly, unbearably adorable boy.
Was this youth?
To stride down the right path, to speak justice aloud, to turn the whole world upside down if that was what it took.
How could anyone not be moved? How could anyone bear to pour cold water on it again? Wasn't this the very reckless, upstream madness Akiya had craved his entire life?
"Suguru…" he said quietly, "if you can do it, then I will call you my friend for the rest of my life."
Just this once, let them both be outrageously arrogant.
If you can do it, then so can I.