The transfer went through quickly.
Two hundred million yen did not take long to clear before it was credited.
After Asou Akiya sent the message, Ieiri Shoko seemed as though she had been waiting at Tokyo Jujutsu High for this very moment.
He played the role of a nameless, mysterious benefactor for once, and along the way, he deliberately imitated Geto Suguru's habits when exorcising cursed spirits, thoroughly clearing out the cursed presences both inside and outside the villa. As he prepared to leave, he patted the puppy on the head and bade farewell to the couple. "There's no need to see me off, and no need to trouble yourselves over my origins. Disasters fall upon this world every moment of every day—now and then, a bit of good fortune is what keeps things balanced."
"Also, on a personal note, I hope you won't sell this villa."
"Please live well."
"No matter how hard or exhausting things become, grit your teeth and endure. Don't disappoint those who reached out to help you."
"I'll come visit you again next year. I wish for your family of three to live in harmony."
"Little one, make sure you keep being happy."
Those who loved cats and dogs always earned a little extra kindness from him.
Asou Akiya crouched down and hugged the little girl, as though he could draw positive strength from her small body.
The girl did not understand many complicated things. Seeing smiles return to her parents' faces, she smiled as well, only feeling that the black-haired older brother with the puppy pressed close to him looked especially nice, warm light seeming to radiate from him.
"Big brother, see you next year!"
…
Back at Tokyo Jujutsu High, Asou Akiya successfully secured the money, yet couldn't help wondering why he hadn't been the one to swipe the card himself.
Ieiri Shoko replied as if it were nothing at all, "It's just more convenient for me to handle the transfer."
Asou Akiya understood her kindness without needing it spelled out.
That way, the Gojo family wouldn't have to be directly involved, and no one would question why Ieiri Shoko had spent such a large sum of money. After all, the jujutsu world's "nanny" could spend her money however she pleased as long as it wasn't illegal.
As for the matter of interest, Asou Akiya treated the lender as though it were Gojo Satoru. He knew that if it were Gojo lending the money, interest would never even be considered—Gojo only cared whether something was feasible and whether it was interesting. Respecting Gojo's way of doing things didn't mean Akiya could take advantage of it with a clear conscience, so he discussed it with Ieiri Shoko. "Shoko, I'll definitely repay everything I owe in three years. Please keep this a secret for me. I don't want to face him feeling like I'm indebted to him. Even if I secretly make it up to him, I want him to remain unaware."
At the entrance to the girls' dormitory, Ieiri Shoko readily agreed to everything. It was only after he left that she gave a sly smile.
[Tomorrow is Saturday.]
[I'll tell you the truth on Monday, Asou.]
Let Gojo experience what it felt like to have Mei Mei-senpai steal someone right out from under him.
In truth, Ieiri Shoko herself had been surprised. After she named an interest rate, the senior she had not interacted with much agreed without hesitation and even asked whether the loan was for Asou Akiya.
Stepping into the dormitory corridor, Ieiri Shoko ran into Mei Mei waiting for her at the corner.
Mei Mei stood with one arm folded across her chest, the other hand hooking her ponytail, her mature makeup unable to conceal the teasing glint in her eyes.
"Junior Ieiri, and you still say you weren't borrowing money for him?"
"Oh dear, you caught me, senpai—but we really aren't dating."
When it came time to clarify, Ieiri Shoko never wavered, making sure to prevent unnecessary trouble for either party.
"Since you're saying it so earnestly, I'll believe about seventy percent of it," Mei Mei said. She understood the bonds between jujutsu sorcerers—though she herself didn't share them, loving only money. Ieiri Shoko then voiced the question that had been bothering her. "Are you very familiar with Asou?"
Mei Mei shook her head. "After we exchanged contact information, he never reached out to me even once."
Ieiri Shoko frowned in puzzlement. "And yet you think so highly of him?"
Mei Mei smiled, all charm and allure. "I get a high rate of interest, and I don't have to worry about you defaulting on the debt—why wouldn't I do it? And if it really comes to the point where you can't repay it, I believe Junior Gojo will settle the account for you."
The light in Ieiri Shoko's eyes instantly dulled into a dead-fish stare. "Oh. So the one you trust is Gojo."
Mei Mei shook her head again. "I rarely invest in a single person. The risk is too great. It's far more reliable to invest in fixed assets—who knows when or where sorcerers might fall in the line of duty? But Junior Asou is different. Since enrolling, he's built remarkably good relationships with all of you. Even the most troublesome one, Junior Gojo, is willing to give him a bit of leeway."
"Recently, I've been in contact with assistant supervisors and have been trying to get my foot into that circle. Do you know what I found out?" Mei Mei's lips curved upward. "Junior Asou is actually quite famous among the assistant supervisors. They regard him as a savior. Ha—a savior."
She could hardly describe the thrill of discovering such a 'treasure,' mixed with the amusement of finding someone who shared her wavelength.
"He's already taken over the logistics for your entire first-year class."
"Truly impressive—he achieved, without lifting a finger, what even I couldn't manage."
"As for the other sorcerers in this regard, they're far too naive… no, they're not even on the same level."
"Junior Asou's talents are nowhere near as simple as they appear on the surface. I'm willing to befriend him and discuss clever ways of making money together. Please pass on my words, Junior Ieiri—I have no desire to be Junior Gojo's stand-in."
Mei Mei gave Ieiri Shoko a look brimming with the hunger for profit that comes after stepping into adulthood.
Ieiri Shoko found it hard to accept.
She replied perfunctorily, "Mm-hm, got it. I'll look for a chance to tell him on Monday. I hope you enjoy making friends, senpai."
No longer inclined to continue the conversation, Ieiri Shoko returned to her dorm room and glanced at the alarm clock by her bed, its hands already past midnight.
In the blink of an eye, it was already Saturday—00:03 in the dead of night.
"Time really does fly."
...
October 1st.
Clear skies.
7:40 a.m.
Saturday breakfast was unusually lavish. Asou Akiya prepared three different kinds of meals; after finishing one himself, he delivered the two remaining plates—one spicy, one not—to the two male classmates. Toward Gojo Satoru, his attitude had returned to its former gentleness. Gojo sat at the dining table, his "Six Eyes" sweeping over the dishes again and again, until a creeping sense of dread took hold.
Gojo Satoru absolutely refused to admit that he was afraid of eating spicy food, yet his entire posture had gone on high alert.
"You're not eating?" Asou Akiya set the chopsticks neatly in front of him, amused despite himself. "Your breakfast is about to get cold."
"I don't eat extra-spicy stuff," Gojo declared, drawing his line in advance.
"There's nothing extra-spicy," Asou Akiya assured him.
"Don't you dare lie to me…" Gojo hesitated. Just as he was about to pick up his chopsticks, his arm suddenly jerked. From next door, Geto Suguru erupted into earth-shattering coughs—he had already been slain by the heat, bursting out in near tears to find the culprit.
"Asou—you—! You almost killed me!"
Geto Suguru clutched the handle of Gojo's dorm room door; in less than a moment, his eyes were bloodshot and his lips swollen and reddened.
Today's breakfast looked utterly ordinary, yet the spiciness was beyond imagination.
Devil-level.
Gojo Satoru froze, staring at his own meal with resistance. "Akiya, I don't want to eat anymore."
Geto Suguru grabbed Gojo's chopsticks for him. "Eat! You're eating every last bite too!"
Gojo Satoru: "..."
Asou Akiya: "..."
Geto Suguru, looking half-mad, shouted, "Asou, no differential treatment! I refuse to accept this! He has to eat this breakfast too!"
Asou Akiya twitched the corner of his mouth at Geto Suguru's reaction—did he really think acting crazy would settle everything?
"Gojo, I'll feed you then. Open your mouth," Asou Akiya coaxed him gently, as if tending to a small child.
"Your tone is so disgusting—there's no way I can do that…" Gojo Satoru's expression twisted in resistance.
"Don't you trust me?" Asou Akiya asked in return.
"Fine." After steeling himself, Gojo Satoru swallowed a big spoonful of the seafood porridge Asou Akiya held out to him.
Geto Suguru waited in feverish anticipation for Gojo to gag and spit it out…
Gojo Satoru's eyes lit up. "Hey, this is good."
Asou Akiya explained calmly, "Well, it is the result of four hours of simmering this morning."
Gojo Satoru began eating in big mouthfuls; he had been hungry for a long time already.
The two of them completely ignored the petrified Geto Suguru.
Thoughtfully, Asou Akiya added, "Have another bite of the cold-dressed napa cabbage and the boiled broccoli too. They're rich in vitamins and dietary fiber—good for promoting metabolism."
Gojo Satoru basked smugly in his own charm; clearly, only Geto Suguru was the unlucky one here.
Geto Suguru swayed on his feet, bracing both hands against the edge of the table as he said, "This isn't fair…"
Asou Akiya replied in a low, drifting voice, "Since when has this world ever been fair? Fairness is nothing more than something produced by power and authority."
Geto Suguru burst out in indignation, "Yesterday afternoon, he and I teamed up to trick you into the domain!"
Hey—what is he trying to do? Gojo Satoru kicked Geto Suguru under the table, but he failed to stop him.
Asou Akiya smiled with a kindness so radiant it seemed almost saintly. "How could I possibly blame Gojo?"
In his heart, he quietly added the unspoken second half: [Especially when I now owe him two hundred million yen through Shoko, and he didn't even want a single yen of interest.]
All things considered, Asou Akiya decided not to dwell on the matter of the special-grade cursed spirit and magnanimously forgave Gojo Satoru.
Geto Suguru's dejected expression amused Gojo Satoru so much that he broke his usual rule of not speaking while eating, slapped his thigh, and laughed loudly. "Geto's lips are swollen like sausages—hahahahaha!"
Geto Suguru stormed off in fury.
Sunday.
For two days straight, Geto Suguru received one kind of treatment, while Gojo Satoru received an entirely different one.
After finishing the carefully prepared breakfast, Gojo Satoru asked with curiosity, "You didn't secretly get revenge, did you? Are you really not angry?"
Asou Akiya smiled faintly, silently recalling that someone had been willing to lend him two hundred million yen to help him save lives. His mood was light; the smile dissolved the pressure of being in debt, and without realizing it, he displayed an attitude of special kindness reserved only for Gojo Satoru.
Gojo Satoru grew alert. "You didn't do anything shady, did you, Akiya?"
The TV always said that people who acted abnormally were usually the ones who had done something bad.
Asou Akiya gathered the dishes for him and replied, "No. I just did something meaningful."
For example, challenging fate for the first time and saving a family of three who, in the original story, would have met a tragic end.
With no work scheduled over the weekend, Gojo Satoru sprawled across the sofa, flipping through his daily magazine. Even the latest fashion spreads featuring glamorous female celebrities failed to fully capture his attention. Their bewitching figures and deliberately seductive smiles, meant to entice the viewer, were—through the lens of his Six Eyes—far less compelling than the vivid, living expressions of Asou Akiya and Geto Suguru.
Whether it was bickering, trading barbs, or pulling pranks, only those two people by his side felt truly different from everyone else.
After Geto Suguru stormed off, Gojo Satoru suddenly felt the urge to tease Asou Akiya.
He took off his sunglasses, cupped his face with both hands, and mimicked the pose of a model from the magazine, flashing a dazzling wink at his male classmate. Confident that he looked good no matter what he did, he called out, "Akiya! Don't you think I'm especially sexy and charming?"
Asou Akiya said nothing. The plate in his hand cracked under the pressure of his grip. "..."
Gojo, you're only fifteen—could you not become this greasy so fast?
Asou Akiya strode toward the sofa in long, purposeful steps.
Startled, Gojo Satoru stopped his impromptu photoshoot, flipped upright in a smooth, reflexive motion, and sat up, instinctively putting on his brightest I'm-the-best grin, trying to bluff his way through as if he'd done something utterly unforgivable.
Asou Akiya picked up the sunglasses that had been knocked off the sofa, blew the dust from them, and then carefully placed them back on Gojo Satoru's face.
"Let me tell you something," he said. "Do you know what your most attractive pose is?"
"???"
"When you're wearing your sunglasses properly, hiding your face, even a casual sideways glance makes you the most handsome man in the world."
"????????"
Gojo Satoru couldn't understand it. And yet, his Six Eyes told him that Asou Akiya was being completely sincere.
No deliberate posing at all? Something that simple, and he was already the most handsome man in the world?
Gojo Satoru was genuinely confused. Why did the magazine's sense of beauty differ so much from his classmate's? Whose opinion was he supposed to trust?
[Today, I'll trust Akiya's.]
Behind the round sunglasses perched on the bridge of his nose, Gojo Satoru blinked at Asou Akiya with the most beautiful blue eyes in the world. He reached out, grabbed Akiya by the collar, leaned in close, and asked with sparkling curiosity, "When I blink, or when I glance at you like this—can you see it?"
Asou Akiya lowered his voice and replied softly, "It's fine. Even if I can't see it in reality, I'll still see it in my dreams."
Gojo Satoru couldn't understand why one would have to rely on dreams just to see something like that—it sounded far too pitiful. He leaned in even closer. The lenses of the sunglasses weren't completely opaque; they let in a faint trace of light, so faint that unless someone stood extremely close to Gojo Satoru, they would never glimpse the azure sky-like pupils hidden behind them.
"How about now?"
His eyes reflected the sky itself, and his moist lips moved as he spoke.
"Beautiful."
Asou Akiya never tired of admiring Gojo Satoru's Six Eyes. They were a window to the soul.
"By the way." Not letting him continue fooling around, Asou Akiya caught his wrist. "Why did you get bitten by a mosquito again?"
On Gojo Satoru's wrist were the familiar small red marks.
"There are mosquitoes even in October," Gojo Satoru said with brazen confidence, turning his gaze away as the sunglasses concealed the flicker in his eyes.
Every day, the Gojo family sent over medicinal tonics meant to condition and strengthen his body. Gojo Satoru had been drinking them for quite some time now. Aside from calling to complain about how awful they tasted, he showed no obvious reaction at all, which left the Gojo family deeply disappointed. They had no idea that while their young heir stayed up late at night, he was freely and recklessly burning through his energy, completely canceling out the growth-promoting effects of the medicine.
Once Geto Suguru stopped coming around, Gojo Satoru's routine returned to normal for two consecutive days. During the day his mind wandered restlessly, and as night fell into silence, the accumulated medicinal effects finally began to surface, forcibly ripening this healthy body in the midst of adolescence.
Last night, after Gojo Satoru kissed his wrist, he fell into another strange, surreal dream.
It felt as though he had been thrown into a furnace, his body scorched by heat. A torrent of warmth surged up from his lower abdomen and swept through his limbs and bones, so unbearable that he kicked off the blanket and kept tugging at his clothes, until Asou Akiya appeared within the dream. The situation didn't improve—if anything, it grew worse. This overly attentive guy actually pulled the blanket over him and pinned down his flailing hands and feet!
Gojo Satoru writhed on the bed. In the dream, Asou Akiya covered his mouth, his eyes grew damp, and he couldn't even curse.
The other man coaxed him gently, soothing him into sleep.
He was in a daze—
Drifting in and out of consciousness.
Then, in the very next moment, that figure transformed into a woman he adored—a mature, beautiful older sister type—who gathered him into her arms, locking him against her waist so tightly it felt as though she intended to suffocate him within that fervent, feverish embrace.
Afterward, Gojo Satoru was jolted awake by the heat alone, his body left in complete disarray, the aftermath unmistakable and humiliatingly real.
He had no choice but to get up early, destroy the evidence by stripping the sheets, and immediately call the head of the Gojo clan, unleashing a solid hour of furious, unrestrained verbal abuse over the phone.
The Gojo family head, battered by that storm of rage, listened through it all and replied with only a single sentence:
"Lord Gojo, please calm down and have some cooling tea."
Cooling tea? Would that even help?
The real-world Gojo Satoru sat there absentmindedly, clearly unconvinced.
So when Asou Akiya asked him what he wanted to eat for lunch, Gojo answered on pure instinct, without thinking at all:
"I want cooling tea."
That's right—he wanted it. It definitely wasn't to cool off his temper or anything!
Grinding his teeth, Gojo Satoru snapped, "Akiya, I've been afraid of heat lately. If you ever dare to put a blanket on me again, I'll curse you to death!"
Asou Akiya looked him up and down, baffled by the sudden outburst, then connected it with the suspicious sensitivity around his wrist and couldn't help but smile knowingly.
"When you finally learn how to live on your own," Aso Akiya said lightly, "when you actually know how to take care of yourself, then I'll stop worrying about you."
Wake up.
You're still just a boy who doesn't even know how to comfort himself.