So This Is How People Make Friends Outside?
Gojo Satoru stood frozen in the shadows of the dormitory corridor, utterly shaken.
He sank into deep thought.
No wonder he had never had friends. It turned out no one had ever been worth swearing an oath for.
That was so insanely cool. Becoming a Special Grade just for the sake of friendship? It was a thousand times cooler than all those hot-blooded shōnen protagonists who did it "for world peace"!
The white-haired boy had originally snuck out because he hated the two of them whispering behind his back and wanted to catch them badmouthing him. Instead, he had overheard their "badmouthing," and now he found himself completely unwilling to jump out and scold them.
Was he… the unnecessary one here?
The two of them looked incredibly close. Weird-bangs was even willing to storm Headquarters alone for Akiya someday.
Once a sorcerer reached Special Grade, they truly no longer had to fear Headquarters. The last person who had lived that way was Tsukumo Yuki: she took whatever missions she felt like, stayed abroad for years, and gave Headquarters exactly zero face.
Satoru's train of thought derailed spectacularly, and only then did the realization hit him like a delayed freight train:
[Asou Akiya almost died at Headquarters?]
The Six Eyes, vast as the sky itself, blinked rapidly in confusion.
Akiya was a little tangerine hired by the Gojo clan—family staff, basically. Visiting Headquarters was just standard procedure, right?
Unless Headquarters had grown bold enough to murder a member of the Three Great Families for no reason at all?
[Has my clan really fallen this far?!]
The conclusion struck him like a slap. Satoru's healthy pink lips fell open in outrage.
[What useless trash.]
He stomped in place, fury boiling. Which old tangerine had spent his entire childhood droning, "Young Master Satoru, you are the heir of one of the Three Great Families. You must carry yourself with dignity, master your etiquette lessons, and never allow outsiders to look down on your authority"?
Back when the Gojo clan had been the weakest of the Three Great Families, fine—he could stomach it. But even after he was born, they still had to swallow this kind of humiliation?
The Gojo clan had poured every resource into protecting him until his Limitless could stay active twenty-four hours a day, finally easing the suffocating security that wouldn't let a single fly near him.
He had always considered the clan his possession and had never forgotten the clansmen who died shielding him.
As a child he had watched blood—enemy and family alike—splash across his feet without a ripple of emotion, simply because he could not yet comprehend the weight of a life.
But that did not mean he was a cold, bloodless clay idol.
He hadn't even formally met Headquarters yet, and they were already giving him a show of force.
Rotten tangerines! Rotten tangerines! Just you wait!
I'll beat every last one of you to death sooner or later!
Satoru shot a vicious glare at the two figures descending the mountain path, rolled his eyes once, and vanished back into the dormitory like a ghost.
Cursed Spirit Manipulation was such a cheating technique. Unlike him, even if Suguru exorcised Special Grade cursed spirits left and right, the higher-ups would still drag their feet promoting him—grade advancement depended partly on seniority, achievements, and recommenders.
Weird-bangs' only shot at overtaking him was to subjugate a Special Grade cursed spirit and use its overwhelming presence to intimidate a jujutsu world that currently lacked top-tier fighters.
But… not a chance!
He would personally exorcise every last Special Grade spirit and leave none for weird-bangs. Victory guaranteed.
On top of that, he would prioritize mastering Reversal Red and full Reverse Cursed Technique as soon as humanly possible. If weird-bangs actually overtook him on a technicality, he would lose all face, and the old tangerines back home would never shut up about it.
…
Classroom building.
The moment first period began, Ieri Shoko sensed something off in the air, though she couldn't quite put her finger on what it was.
Gojo Satoru was exactly the same as ever: the moment the class wasn't taught by Yaga Masamichi, he would immediately start provoking the boy in the next seat. Long legs would stretch out to kick Geto Suguru's chair, paper balls covered in bizarre insults would fly, and the air would crackle with mischief. Yet Suguru refused to rise to the bait. Even when a crumpled note bounced off his temple, the most he allowed himself was a twitching vein on his forehead. He kept his expression impeccably polite, showing not the slightest inclination to start another brawl in front of the assistant supervisor.
During the lecture, Suguru devoured every historical record about Special Grade cursed spirits, filling page after page with notes, drafting exorcism plans, and mapping out tactics with the grim dedication of a veteran first-grade sorcerer. It reached a level that made everyone else feel faintly ashamed of their own laziness.
No first-grade sorcerer in history had ever been this obsessed with murdering Special Grades, right?
Ieri Shoko felt more out of place than ever. She stole a glance at Asou Akiya and saw that he, at least, seemed normal. Then she looked closer and nearly face-palmed. Normal? Hardly. The boy who usually listened to every lecture with laser focus was, for the first time, completely zoned out.
The black-haired boy ignored the two powder kegs beside him and stared into the middle distance, eyes unfocused, thoughts drifting somewhere beyond the stratosphere. His phone lay dark and untouched on the desk; messages went unread. It was as if only an empty, contemplative shell remained in his seat.
Had his soul gone on a stroll without the rest of him?
Break time.
For the first time ever, Ieri Shoko found herself cornered by the usually aloof Gojo Satoru.
He shoved a box of Kyoto sweets toward her like a peace offering and fixed her with an earnest, sparkling stare. "Shoko, teach me Reverse Cursed Technique. Please."
The Six Eyes blinded her for a second—sky-blue, mirror-clear, impossibly bright, as though someone had bottled a summer noon and set it floating in mist.
Remembering the dumbfounded look on Suguru's face the last time he had asked the same question, Shoko magnanimously raised her right hand, waved it theatrically as if brandishing an invisible fairy wand, and declared, "It's super easy! You just go whoosh like this… and then whoosh again! That's literally how I mastered Reverse Cursed Technique!"
Satoru stared.
Shoko had successfully made the strongest sorcerer of the modern age experience true asphyxiation: after listening to her explanation, he felt exactly as enlightened as before he had asked.
Having wasted both time and brain cells, Satoru returned to his seat in perfect zombie synchronization—arms and legs moving in eerie unison.
"Pfft—" Suguru failed to swallow his laughter.
Click. Akiya's phone camera captured the historic moment for posterity.
Shoko assumed Satoru would sulk for the rest of the day, but Yaga Masamichi strode in and cut straight to the point. "Next period is outdoor practical training. Ieri, you stay behind. The rest of you, with me—we're going cursed-spirit hunting."
Shoko's feet were already oiled for escape from whatever male drama was brewing.
"Aren't you coming, Shoko?" Akiya asked, snapping out of his daze just in time to catch Yaga's utterly unarguable expression.
"I'll record everything for you," Akiya offered with timely gentlemanly grace. "High-definition, full commentary—guaranteed front-row experience."
Shoko waved him off. "Next time. First mission—stay alive."
She added under her breath, "Those two look ready to declare war any second."
Akiya stifled a yawn and sighed with fond resignation. "They're as energetic as ever."
Almost a full month after enrollment, the first official outdoor practical had arrived with the abruptness of a premeditated ambush. Akiya was quietly grateful to Yaga-sensei for not throwing them straight into the fire on day one; otherwise he would have felt less like a student at a prestigious jujutsu academy and more like a factory worker screwing bolts onto an assembly line.
Shoko was right: the first outdoor practical demanded total focus. There could be no regrets, no do-overs.
It was just… he was so incredibly tired.
Was Headquarters punishing him for refusing to obey?
Asou Akiya stood under a sun already high in the sky, eyelids fighting a losing battle, flanked by two boys who seemed to run on pure, inexhaustible adrenaline.
The site for today's practical was a hospital that had been temporarily shut down for "renovations."
"The main targets are two Grade-1 cursed spirits," Yaga Masamichi explained as they reached the entrance. "Secondary targets: multiple Grade-3 and Grade-4 spirits." He handed over identification to the security guards, who took one look, paled, and stepped silently aside, watching a middle-aged teacher lead three apparent high-schoolers straight into a death trap.
Gojo Satoru was practically vibrating with excitement. The Six Eyes swept the building inside and out, layer by layer.
Yaga had no worries; he let the boy look to his heart's content. It would be a crime not to exploit the Six Eyes while they were here—every current of cursed energy in the entire hospital was laid bare to that gaze.
Satoru sneered at the findings and announced loudly enough for the whole street to hear, "Tch. Nothing but small fry."
The hospital was enormous. Suguru heard the taunt and immediately prepared to summon spirits for reconnaissance, only to be stopped by Yaga's raised hand.
Akiya noticed that Satoru's gaze kept drifting upward, so he offered quietly, "Check the lower levels too—they are usually the forgotten corners."
The iron law of jujutsu fieldwork: something always goes wrong on your first practical. It was practically tradition.
Satoru froze mid-scan. His voice dropped to ice. "Basement. There's one hiding extremely well. It has a technique. Cursed-energy volume sits right between semi-first and full first grade."
Yaga nodded, satisfied. "Good. Now test yourselves: what is our very first step?"
"Exterminate them!" Satoru declared and lunged for the doors.
Suguru seized the back of his collar and yanked him backward. "I believe the correct answer is 'drop the curtain,' so civilians don't see."
Akiya grabbed Satoru's raised right hand—already shaped like a gun—and clamped down hard, preventing the technique from firing. He added quickly, "The curtain is the foundational application of barrier techniques. Every sorcerer must learn it from scratch. Once mastered, you're allowed to operate solo because you can create an isolated battlefield before every exorcism."
This was basic sorcerer common sense—memorized by heart by every Jujutsu High student except, apparently, one Gojo Satoru.
Akiya continued without pause. "There are two broad categories: ordinary curtains and entrusted curtains. The ordinary version is mandatory for assistant supervisors. The entrusted version is an advanced form available only to true barrier masters. It allows the caster to set binding vows of equivalent exchange, vastly expanding its uses. For example, today a powerful entrusted curtain could sacrifice the strength needed to trap everyone inside in exchange for a rule that specifically bars Gojo Satoru and Geto Suguru from entering."
Suguru's eyes lit up like a child handed the keys to a candy store. A curtain that could keep Satoru out?
Suddenly the process of subduing cursed spirits and swallowing their orbs felt a whole lot safer.
Yaga Masamichi's worldview quietly cracked open; he stared at the boy as though questioning every career choice that had led him here. "I have never in my life seen a curtain of that calibre. Barrier techniques are simple to pick up but monstrously difficult to master. If what you say is true, only the legendary grandmasters of history could manage it."
Asou Akiya answered calmly, "In the current jujutsu world, at least two people can still do it. Gojo and Geto both have the potential as well."
Yaga's eyes bulged. "Names."
Akiya did not hesitate. "Lord Tengen and Tsukumo Yuki. The advanced form of barrier technique is, of course, Domain Expansion."
Satoru tilted his head, genuinely curious. "I know Tsukumo Yuki, but who's Tengen?"
Geto Suguru: "…"
Is this guy really Illiterate?
Yaga sighed so deeply it seemed to come from the marrow of his bones. "The Gojo clan's homeschooling is a disgrace."
For a thousand years the history of sorcery had revolved around the name "Tengen." The master of barriers who resided in the Star Plasma Palace, indifferent to worldly affairs, single-handedly upholding the foundational wards of the entire jujutsu world—yet the heir of one of the Three Great Families had never even heard the name?
Geto Suguru declared with righteous indignation, "Sensei, please give Gojo a zero in history. Immediately."
"You're pure evil, weird-bangs!" Satoru yelped the moment failing grades were mentioned.
He defended himself with perfect confidence. "I haven't reached the Domain Expansion unit yet! The clan insists on proper order—master technique reversal and reversal technique first, then construct a proper innate domain. I had a Simple Domain down before I was ten. That's already way better than weird-bangs, who doesn't know a single thing about barriers!"
Suguru's narrow eyes glittered with honest confusion. Simple Domain? What was that?
Akiya supplied the answer. "A Simple Domain—sometimes called the domain of the weak. It can resist a true Domain Expansion for a short time. The first person to dismiss it as trash was, at minimum, a Special Grade sorcerer."
At the very least, Akiya himself still had hope of learning it someday.
Judging by the lost look on Yaga-sensei's face, however, barrier talent was not evenly distributed.
The extracurricular lesson on barriers was essentially hijacked by Akiya, vastly expanding Suguru's knowledge and mercilessly exposing Satoru's gaping blind spots.
Yaga, recovering his teacherly pride, raised his right hand—index, middle, and thumb extended—and pressed the fingers to his lips. "Emerge from the darkness, blacker than darkness. Purify that which is impure."
A curtain of pure black unfurled from the sky above the hospital and descended like a funeral shroud, swallowing the entire complex.
Akiya murmured in quiet awe, "That range is absurd."
In any anime this would be an ultimate technique. Here, even a lowly assistant supervisor could cast it.
Yaga allowed himself a small, satisfied smile. "And that's still far from its limit."
Akiya shook his head with a faint, knowing smile. He wasn't talking about the curtain itself.
He was talking about the distant, invisible reinforcement Lord Tengen layered onto every curtain cast by a sorcerer in Japan.
The day Tengen was lost, the jujutsu world had trembled; the higher-ups had packed their bags and fled in the dead of night. That wasn't even an exaggeration.
Kenjaku was Geto Suguru's mortal enemy, the one who would one day steal his face, his voice, and his life.
If they were ever to stand a chance against Kenjaku in the future, Lord Tengen was an indispensable ally they absolutely had to win over.
The thought struck Asou Akiya like a sudden migraine right in the middle of this bright, ridiculous youth.
Suguru, being friends with you is genuinely exhausting.
While those words echoed in Akiya's skull, the oblivious Suguru was earnestly receiving Yaga-sensei's guidance on the curtain, laying the first stones of a barrier foundation. Meanwhile, Gojo Satoru had wedged himself against Akiya's side, cutting off the lecture entirely, and whispered with the subtlety of a marching band, "Little tangerine, exactly how many jobs do you have? Are you planning to tutor me in barriers now too?"
Akiya's temple throbbed. Little tangerine? Had the family nickname officially migrated into everyday use?
He decided to roll with it. "Don't overthink it. I'm just your personal cheerleader. Right now, the most important thing is that you don't forget what a curtain is even for."
Satoru puffed out his chest. "As if I'd forget something that basic!"
"Got it," Akiya replied, raising his phone with a serene smile. "Recording started."
Suguru glanced over, curiosity sharpening in his eyes. Sorcerer hearing was nothing to scoff at.
Akiya… how does he know so much? Part-time cram school instructor?
And "little tangerine"—is that some Three Great Families slang?
Yaga assigned tasks: Satoru and Suguru would each take one of the Grade-1 spirits, racing to see who could reach and claim the hidden semi-first-grade in the basement first. Akiya's job was to advance slowly from the perimeter, mop up every Grade-3 and Grade-4 he encountered, rack up experience points, and worry about quality later—quantity was the goal.
The three of them strode toward the hospital, objectives clear, stepping together into their first clumsy, exhilarating joint mission.
…
Kyoto. Gojo Clan Estate.
The current head of the Gojo clan, the very man who had pushed for Satoru's enrollment at Jujutsu High, received word that Headquarters was asking questions about Asou Akiya's background.
He denied everything with perfect composure and stated that a thorough investigation had already been conducted: Asou Akiya was an orphan, bore no blood relation to the Gojo whatsoever, and had entered the school solely on Yaga Masamichi's personal recommendation.
Headquarters fell silent.
Were those three one-way binding vows fake, then? Was the Gojo clan blatantly lying through their teeth?
But since their own intentions toward Akiya had never been pure to begin with, Headquarters could not press too openly. They chose careful, diplomatic wording: "Asou Akiya is perhaps… a little too attentive to Gojo Satoru. Others are not blind."
The clan head answered without hesitation, "Young Master Satoru is peerless in grace and bearing. The moment he was born he shook the world. It is only natural that he is adored."
These were not empty words; every soul in the Gojo clan believed them with religious fervor.
Male classmate? Irrelevant.
The entire world ought to fall at the feet of the Six Eyes.
Ever since the day Satoru's Limitless became strong enough to protect him, every annual gathering of the Three Great Families had turned into a silent parade: the white-haired, blue-eyed heir would appear flanked by maids, gliding through the crowd like moonlight on water. Conversation died the instant he entered; no one dared raise their voice, terrified of earning even a flicker of displeasure from those heavenly eyes.
Whenever the Gojo clan had the slightest chance to parade their heir, they seized it with both hands and lorded it over their ancient rivals without mercy.
Headquarters: "…"
After a long, painful silence, Headquarters managed, "Calling Gojo Satoru 'Lord Divine Child'… that is your clan's tradition?"
"Lord Divine Child?" The Gojo patriarch paused, genuinely surprised, then fell into thoughtful remembrance. In his mind's eye he saw the winter day Satoru was born: the child the clan had awaited for five centuries opened his eyes and the entire sky poured into them, breathtaking and otherworldly. Then the infant had drifted back to sleep in his swaddling clothes, breathing softly, tiny fists loosely curled, already so impossibly beautiful that he seemed to belong to some higher realm.
What a perfect title.
It suited Satoru's aloof, all-seeing majesty to perfection.
A slow, delighted smile spread across the patriarch's face. "Young Master Satoru is heaven's gift to the Gojo clan. Of course he is our Divine Child."
His tone carried the arrogance of absolute certainty and the cool distance of a priest speaking of a living god rather than his own flesh and blood.
Gojo Satoru did not need parents.
No one in the clan was worthy of that name. The Gojo were merely the cradle that had nurtured him.
He would one day become clan head, but only because the clan had paved the way, and out of deference to bloodline they would let him sit on the throne that was already destined to be his while they handled the trivialities of running the family.
Headquarters could no longer stomach the Gojo clan's fanaticism. It was outright deranged. Not even the Zen'in clan was this obsessed with their inherited Ten Shadows Technique, and the Kamo would certainly never act this way over their measly Blood Manipulation.
In the end, Headquarters swallowed the insult and let it pass.
Polite pleasantries were exchanged, barbed implications buried beneath every word. The Gojo patriarch once again pressed Headquarters to issue the Special Grade certification.
A fifteen-year-old Gojo Satoru was fully qualified to be registered as Special Grade!
Headquarters stonewalled with their favorite tactic—delay. They refused, citing Satoru's own renunciation of the clan-based evaluation system, and insisted he follow the standard Jujutsu High promotion route.
As unspoken compensation for the insult, Headquarters quietly moved Asou Akiya from the blacklist to the whitelist.
If they couldn't touch him, they would simply pretend he didn't exist.
…
From this day forward, Gojo Satoru—who had not been home in months—remained blissfully unaware that he had acquired yet another grandiose title.
Lord Divine Child of the Gojo Clan!!